WIMPLES 
CMSPINCrHNS- 

BEING-STVDIES-INTHE 
COIFFVREAND-ORNA 

MENTS- OF  WOMEN 

BY  THEODORE- CHILD 

ILLVSTRATED 


NEW-YORK 

H  ARPER-AND  -BROTHERS 
1895 


GT  a 

.  Ci 


Copyright,  1894,  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS. 


rights  reserved. 


CONTENTS 


Oil  APT  KB  PAGK 

I.  EGYPT 1 

II.  ASIA 15 

III.  ATHENS           31 

IV.  ROME 47 

V.  THE    MIDDLE     AGES 74 

VI.  FLORENCE 93 

VII.  VENICE 112 

VIII.  THE    SPANISH    TOQUE         .........  130 

IX.  THE    EIGHTEENTH    CENTURY 143 

X.  THE    ROMANTIC    PERIOD 169 

XI.  ON    JEWELRY    AND    ORNAMENTS 191 


325481 


ILLUSTKATIONS 


PAGK 

COUNTESS  OP   ALBANY Frontispiece 

GUINEA-HEN  HELMET .      .  5 

EGYPTIAN   LADY 8 

EGYPTIAN   COIFFURE 11 

WOMAN   OP   OULED  NAIL   TRIBE,  ALGERIA 19 

WOMAN   OP   OULED  NAIL  TRIBE,  ALGERIA 25 

ISHTAR 29 

VENUS   OF   GNIDOS  WITH  THE   DOUBLE   FILLET 32 

THE   MUSE   THALIA 36 

A  QUEEN  WITH  THE   CYPRIOTE  CURLS 37 

A  VENUS  WITH  THE  BOW 40 

LEKANE  FOUND   AT  KERTCH 42 

APHRODITE  ANADYOMENE 45 

DANCING-WOMAN  WITH   SIMPLE  FILLET 48 

DANCING-WOMAN   WITH   RINGLETS  IN  FRONT 51 

EMPRESS  FAUSTINA 55 

JUNO 59 

VESTAL  VIRGIN 63 

JULIA,  DAUGHTER  OF  TITUS 67 

DIDIA   CLARA 71 

PORTRAIT  OP   A   LADY,  BY  PIERO  DELLA  FRANCESCA  ...  77 

A  LADY  WITH  A  FERRONNIERE 83 

THE  DUCHESS  OP  URBINO 87 

PORTRAIT  OF  TWO   GIRLS,  BY  BERNARD   VAN  ORLEY  ...  91 


viii 


PAGE 

HEAD   OF   A   GRACE   BY  BOTTICELLI 99 

FROM  A   DRAWING  BY  LEONARDO   DA  VINCI 102 

TREACHERY  AND   FRAUD  DRESSING  THE   HAIR  OF   CALUMNY   105 

WAVES   AND   TORSADES 107 

FROM  A  FRESCO   BY  PIERO   DELLA  FRANCESCA          .       .       .       .109 

ELEONORA  OF  TOLEDO,  BY  BRONZING 115 

VIOLANTE,  BY  PALMA   VECCHIO 121 

PEARLS  AND   JEWELS,  FROM   A   PICTURE  BY   TITIAN     .       .       .127 

MARGUERITE   OF   PARMA,  BY   COELLO 133 

MARIA   OF   AUSTRIA,  BY   COELLO 139 

DIANE   DE   POITIERS,  BY  JEAN   GOUJON 147 

DUTCH     LADIES    WALKING,    FROM     A     PAINTING     BY    DAVID 

TENIERS 151 

MARIE  MANCINI,  BY  PIERRE  MIGNARD     .......  155 

STUDY  OF  A  HEAD,  BY  WATTE AU ,    .  159 

BUST  OF  MARIE  ADELAIDE .  163 

BUST  OF  MARIE  ADELAIDE — REVERSE  VIEW 167 

EMPRESS  JOSEPHINE,  BY  PRUD'HON     .    .     .    ,     .    .     .     .171 

THE  SISTERS,  BY  DEVERIA      .     .     . 175 

COUNTESS  DE  SAINT- JEAN  D'ANGELY,  BY  GERARD  .    .     .     .179 

MADAME  PREVOST,  BY  GREVEDON 183 

"MARIE,"  BY  GREVEDON 187 

GOLD  WREATH  OF  MYRTLE  LEAVES,  ANTIQUE  IT ALO- GREEK  193 
TWO  FIBULAE  OF  BEATEN  GOLD,  ANTIQUE  ITALO-GREEK     .  195 

ANTIQUE  ITALO-GREEK  EAR-RINGS 196 

ANTIQUE  ITALO-GREEK  EAR-RING 197 

RENAISSANCE  PENDANT  AND  BRACELET 200 

MIRROR-CASE,  FOURTEENTH  CENTURY,  FRENCH 202 

SIXTEENTH  CENTURY  COMB,  FRENCH 203 

SIXTEENTH  CENTURY  COMB,  ITALIAN 204 

RENAISSANCE  PENDANT 206 

THE  MERMAN    .  .  207 


INTRODUCTION 

"  BUT  you  will  say  that  hair  is  but  an  excremen- 
titious  thing." — Thomas  Howell,  Familiar  Letters. 

Herder,  the  stupendous  German  philosopher, 
compared  hair  to  a  sacred  forest  covering  the  mys- 
teries of  thought.  The  human  body,  he  imagined, 
being  the  type  of  order  par  excellence,  contains  in 
the  hair  natural  disorder  similar  to  the  confusion 
of  the  hirsute  growths  of  the  earth,  which  are 
forests. 

Monsieur  Lefebvre,  the  eminent  capillary  artist, 
in  a  lecture  delivered  in  Paris  in  the  year  1778, 
said : 

"  Coiffure  is  an  art.  To  modify  by  agreeable 
forms  those  long  filaments  with  which  nature 
seems  to  have  intended  to  make  a  veil  rather  than 
an  ornament ;  to  impart  to  those  forms  a  consist- 
ency of  which  the  matter  that  composes  them 
does  not  seem  to  be  susceptible;  to  give  to  abun- 
dance a  regular  arrangement  that  causes  confusion 
to  disappear,  and  to  make  up  for  poverty  by  a 
wealth  which  deceives  the  sharpest  eye ;  to  com- 


bine  accessories  with  the  basis  which  they  are  des- 
tined to  attenuate  or  to  relieve ;  to  strengthen  a 
delicate  face  by  light  tresses ;  to  accompany  a  ma- 
jestic one  by  wavy  tufts ;  to  redeem  the  harshness 
of  features  or  of  eyes  by  a  contrast,  and  sometimes 
by  a  purposed  harmony ;  to  accomplish  all  these 
prodigies  without  other  resources  than  a  comb  and 
a  few  powders  of  different  colors — such  is  the  es- 
sential character  of  our  art. 

"  The  moment  he  sees  a  physiognomy  the  coif- 
feur must  immediately  feel  what  kind  of  ornament 
will  suit  it.  A  woman,  while  appearing  to  have 
her  hair  dressed  like  other  women,  must  neverthe- 
less have  it  arranged  to  suit  her  particular  air. 
Consequently  in  every  toilet  the  artist  is  obliged 
to  renew  the  most  difficult  of  the  miracles  of  Nat- 
ure, which  is  to  be  in  all  her  productions  always 
uniform  and  always  varied." 

All  this  is  true.  Coiffure  is  an  art,  and  a  great 
art,  the  chief est  of  the  decorative  arts,  inasmuch 
as  its  function  is  to  adorn  the  most  perfect  of  nat- 
ure's works,  the  beauty  of  woman.  Therefore  have 
I  ventured  to  write  this  little  work  of  reveries  and 
reflections  on  the  dressing  of  hair  and  the  adorn- 
ment of  beauty,  not  with  a  view  to  superseding 
the  learned  theoretical  and  practical  treatises  of 
the  masters,  nor  yet  with  the  purpose  of  compiling 


xi 


a  history  of  coiffure,  but  with  the  more  special  ob- 
ject of  calling  attention  to  the  wealth  of  example 
and  suggestion  contained  in  the  paintings  and 
sculpture  of  past  ages,  and  of  thus  setting  forth 
indirectly  the  principles  and  conditions  upon  which 
beautiful  coiffure  and  ornament  depend.  The  doc- 
uments that  have  been  used  in  the  illustration  of 
these  chapters  are  for  the  most  part  the  produc- 
tions of  the  greatest  masters  of  art,  statues  and 
pictures  that  are  the  glory  of  the  museums  of 
Europe,  but  which  have  perhaps  rarely  been  re- 
garded hitherto  in  the  special  light  of  models  wor- 
thy of  study  and  imitation  by  the  erudite  successors 
of  Monsieur  Lefebvre,  or  as  sources  of  suggestion 
and  inspiration  by  ladies  who  are  zealous  to  fulfil 
their  mission  of  emblems  of  beauty  and  visions  of 
comeliness. 


and 


EGYPT 

THAT  day  Thoubou'i,  a  rich  young  widow  of  San, 
was  to  entertain  her  friends  at  a  dinner-party. 
Her  house,  situated  on  the  outskirts  of  the  town, 
was  handsome,  and  in  accordance  with  her  fortune, 
but  not  extravagantly  magnificent.  Nevertheless, 
it  was  remarkable  for  the  beauty  of  the  paintings 
on  the  walls  and  ceilings,  in  which  scenes  of  every- 
day life  were  depicted  in  bright  colors  and  in  in- 
genious or  striking  compositions.  Thouboui  was 
also  renowned  for  the  fine  arrangement  of  her  fish- 
ponds, and  of  her  gardens  planted  with  rare  trees 
and  flowers,  and  adorned  with  kiosks  and  alleys 
of  trellised  verdure.  She  possessed  withal  many 
dogs,  cats,  tame  antelopes,  and  long-legged  rose- 
flamingoes,  which,  in  anticipation  of  the  banquet, 
were  wandering  to  and  fro  in  the  court-yard  of 
the  house,  impatiently  awaiting  the  arrival  of  the 


guests,  whom  they  proposed  to  amuse  and  coax 
with  their  familiarities  of  domestic  pets. 

The  banquet  was  prepared  in  a  large  room  or 
veranda  running  along  one  side  of  the  court- yard, 
decorated  with  tapestries  and  hangings  curiously 
woven  and  embroidered,  and  furnished  with  small 
one-legged  tables  of  precious  inlaid  woods,  arm- 
chairs, stools,  footstools,  elegant  consoles  adorned 
with  bouquets  of  blue,  white,  and  rose  lotus  flow- 
ers, nepenthes,  crocus,  and  myosotis,  sideboards 
adorned  with  glass  vessels,  enamelled  pottery,  and 
show-pieces  of  gold  and  ivory.  Thouboui  was 
seated  in  a  room  preceding  the  banqueting-saloon, 
surrounded  by  her  slaves  and  tire-women,  who  had 
decked  her  with  necklaces  and  bracelets,  and  with 
a  pectoral  composed  of  several  rows  of  enamelled 
disks,  golden  pearls,  grains  of  coralline,  and  strings 
of  fishes,  lizards,  and  beetles  of  stamped  gold.  Her 
dress,  with  full  sleeves,  was  of  silk,  with  a  ^arge 
check  pattern  of  carmine  and  saffron  colors,  tied 
with  a  broad  girdle  round  the  waist,  and  terminat- 
ing in  a  flounce  of  horizontal  stripes  of  the  same 
tints,  trimmed  with  gold  fringe,  which  rustled  over 
her  gold-embroidered  leather  shoes  as  she  raised 
her  feet  to  allow  a  slave  to  pass  a  cedar- wood  foot- 
stool. Her  long  black  hair  was  plaited  in  innu- 
merable thin  triple  plaits,  the  ends  of  which  were 


tied  together  in  twos  and  threes  with  woollen 
strings.  These  plaits  hung  over  her  shoulders, 
but  were  bound  together  around  the  head  by  a 
fillet  of  gold  braid  set  with  precious  stones,  while 
a  blue  lotus  flower  hung  over  her  forehead.  The 
shorter  hair  at  the  side  of  the  face  was  interwoven 
with  the  longer  tresses  in  two  or  three  plaits, 
which  were  tied  together  at  the  ends,  and  allowed 
to  hang  clown  and  partly  conceal  the  ear-rings, 
composed  of  large  single  gold  hoops.  Thus  her 
smooth  low  forehead,  her  full  brown  cheeks,  her 
straight  nose,  and  her  finely-chiselled  mouth  seemed 
to  be  presented  in  a  frame,  as  it  were  a  mirror  in 
a  frame  of  glossy  blue-black  hair,  relieved  by  the 
warm  scintillations  of  the  gold,  the  jewels,  and  the 
brilliant  enamels  that  decorated  the  rich  ornaments 
of  her  bosom.  And  in  the  centre  of  this  mirror 
were  two  points  of  dazzling  brilliancy,  Thoubou'i's 
eyes,  the  beauty  of  which  was  enhanced  by  the 
staining  of  the  lids  and  the  blackening  of  the  brows, 
while  the  size  of  the  eye  was  apparently  increased 
by  a  surrounding  ring  of  kohol,  and  by  the  prolon- 
gation of  the  oval  with  a  black  line  of  kohol  drawn 
towards  the  ear. 

Thoubou'i,  holding  a  blue  lotus  in  one  hand  and 
a  copper  mirror  in  the  other,  looked  at  her  reflect- 
ed image  not  without  anxiety,  for  Thouboui  was  in 


love.  Her  heart  yearned  towards  the  young  lord 
Satni,  who  was  to  be  one  of  her  guests,  and  her 
only  desire  was  to  please  Satni  and  win  his  affec- 
tions. Therefore,  not  content  with  the  coiffure 
that  her  slaves  had  composed,  she  called  for  twen- 
ty golden  bodkins  with  spherical  heads,  which  she 
stuck  into  her  hair  above  the  jewelled  fillet.  Then 
taking  a  kohol-box,  which  a  bronze  ape  held  be- 
tween his  paws,  and  dipping  into  the  liquid  an  ivo- 
ry stick,  she  proceeded  to  put  more  black  around 
her  eyes.  Then  she  had  bangles  in  the  form  of 
snakes  of  enamelled  gold  clasped  around  her  an- 
kles ;  and  on  her  fingers,  the  nails  of  which  were 
reddened  with  henne,  she  put  many  gold  rings  of 
various  designs,  wearing  five  rings  on  the  third 
finger  of  her  left  hand,  and  a  ring  on  each  thumb. 

Thouboui  was  now  ready  to  receive,  and  the 
tire-women  withdrew,  while  at  the  same  time  other 
slaves  brought  in  chess-boards,  and  the  musicians 
and  dancing-girls  took  their  places  in  order  to  be 
ready  when  called  upon. 

Meanwhile  the  guests  began  to  arrive,  some  in 
palanquins  and  some  in  carriages,  'and  after  slaves 
had  poured  water  over  their  hands,  and  offered  to 
each  one  a  lotus  flower,  they  entered  the  room 
where  Thouboui  sat,  saluted  her,  took  seats,  and 
conversation  began,  the  ladies  taking  the  lead. 


i   i/T    k 

w    ^ 

5 


And,  most  of  the  ladies  being  of  a  frivolous  turn 
of  mind,  the  talk  at  once  drifted  towards  questions 
of  dress.  This  one  would  fain  know  where  Thou- 
bou'i  bought  her  new  scarabaeus  ring,  and  how 
much  she  paid  for  it.  Another  was  loud  in  her 


GUINEA-HEN    HELMET 


praises  of  the  head-dress  worn  at  a  recent  recep- 
tion by  the  lady  Ea'hel — a  sort  of  helmet  in  the 
shape  of  a  guinea-hen,  with  half-opened  wings  that 
covered  the  temples,  while  the  head  advanced  over 
the  forehead,  forming  a  lovely  ferroniere. 

"This  head-dress,"  continued  the  lady,  "was 
made  by  Zedikah,  a  Hebrew,  who  has  learned  to 


surpass  our  native  craftsmen  in  the  art  of  enamel- 
ling gold.  He  is  the  slave  of  Petoukhan  of  Mem- 
phis, who  made  the  wedding-crown  of  Queen  Ah- 
hotpou.  He  has  imitated  the  eyes  of  the  plumage 
most  divinely.  Unfortunately,  we  married  women 
cannot  wear  such  a  coiffure ;  it  is  the  privilege  of 
virgins." 

"The  lady  Ea'hel  is  the  favorite  of  Ammon," 
said  Thoubou'i,  sadly;  "her  love  is  requited.  Her 
wedding  with  the  prince  Ennana  is  announced  for 
next  month." 

"Happy  Ka'hel!"  cried  a  lady  of  ripe  years, 
who  was  outrageously  painted,  and  dressed  with 
incongruous  ostentation.  "  Happy  Ea'hel !  Young 
and  beautiful,  and  affianced  to  a  young  and  beauti- 
ful prince,  while  I  am  drawing  near  to  the  thresh- 
old of  the  good  dwelling-place  !" 

"  You  are  fishing  for  compliments,  fair  Kophre," 
said  Thoubou'i  to  the  lady  of  ripe  years ;  "  you  shall 
have  none  until  the  court -councillor  Ahmosis  ar- 
rives." 

"Have  you  then  invited  that  flower  of  gentle- 
manliness  ?" 

"Do  you  doubt  my  friendship?"  replied  the 
hostess.  "  Should  I  have  invited  the  bee  without 
at  the  same  time  inviting  the  blossom  ?  But  come ! 
Let  us  have  some  music ;  and  as  you,  Nophre,  have 


your  thoughts  still  bent  upon  amorous  exploits, 
Poeri  shall  sing  us  some  love-songs." 

Thereupon  the  musicians  prepared  their  harps, 
guitars,  and  tambourines,  the  leader  of  the  melody 
applied  the  double  flute  to  her  lips,  and,  at  a  sign 
from  Poeri,  the}7  began  to  play  a  plaintive  strain 
composed  of  a  few  long-drawn  notes,  accompanied 
by  the  beating  of  tambourines  and  the  clapping  of 
hands.  And  Poeri,  the  beautiful  slave,  swaying 
her  body  voluptuously,  began  to  sing  abstractedly, 
and  Avithout  enthusiasm.  But  gradually,  as  the 
shrill  notes  of  the  flute  worked  upon  her  nerves, 
and  the  vibration  of  the  tambourines  thrilled 
through  her  veins,  her  eyes  brightened,  her  bos- 
om swelled,  and,  raising  her  voice,  she  declaimed 
in  clear  tones,  joining  the  words  together,  and  end- 
ing each  sentence  with  prolongations  and  wailing 
variations  upon  the  last  notes : 

"  Thy  love  penetrates  my  heart  as  wine  mixes 
with  water,  as  perfumes  become  one  with  gum,  as 
milk  mingles  with  honey." 

Then  the  double  flutes  and  the  harps  sounded 
again,  and  when  they  were  silent  the  voice  resumed: 

"I  will  lie  down  in  my  chamber;  I  will  be  sick, 
and  the  neighbors  will  come  to  ask  for  news  of  me. 
If  my  beloved  comes  with  them  she  will  put  the 
doctors  to  shame,  for  she  knows  my  malady." 


Then  the  double  flutes  and  the  harps  sounded  the 
intermede,  and  when  they  were  silent  the  voice  re- 
sumed : 

"  The  villa  of  my  beloved  has 
its  fountain  in  front  of  the  house 
door ;  the  door  opens,  and  my  be- 
loved comes  out  in  anger.  Oh! 
that  I  might  become  the  guardian 
of  her  door,  that  she  might  give 
me  orders,  and  that  I  might  hear 
her  voice  even  when  she  is  very 
angry  and  the  children  are  afraid 
of  her!" 

Thoubou'i,  thinking  of  her  pas- 
sion for  Satni,  forgot  her  usual  po- 
liteness so  far  as  to  call  for  her  fa- 
vorite slave  Zari,  and  order  her  to 
sing  an  elegy  of  lost  love,  without 
asking  her  guests  whether  they  pre- 
ferred to  hear  more  music  rather 
than  play  chess  or  draughts. 

In  a  brief  recitative  the  singer 
set  forth  the  situation.     The  hero- 
EGYPTIAN  LADY       ine   of  the   song  explains  to  her 
well-beloved  how  she  has  been  to 
set  nets  to   catch  the  sweetly-perfumed  birds  of 
Fount ;  she  asks  him  to  come  with  her,  and  prom- 


ises  him  to  let  him  hear  the  plaintive  cries  of  her 
beautiful  perfumed  bird ;  but  her  well-beloved  re- 
fuses, and  she  therefore  abandons  the  idea  of  her 
fowling  excursion,  and  pours  out  her  soul  in  a  ten- 
der elegy : 

"  The  cry  of  the  goose  sounds  plaintive,  for  it 
has  taken  the  bait-worm;  but  thy  love  repels  me, 
and  I  cannot  free  myself  from  it.  I  will  take 
away  my  nets  and  snares.  I  will  say  to  my  mother, 
who  sees  me  come  home  every  day  laden  with  cap- 
tives, 'I  no  longer  set  my  snares,'  for  thy  love 
makes  me  prisoner. 

"  The  goose  rises,  settles,  salutes  the  granaries 
with  its  cry ;  swarms  of  birds  cross  the  river,  but 
I  no  longer  pay  heed  to  them;  I  think  of  my  love 
alone,  for  my  heart  is  bound  to  thy  heart,  and  I  can- 
not depart  from  thy  perfections. 

"  My  well-beloved  goes  out  of  his  house ;  he 
passes  without  giving  attention  to  my  love,  and 
my  heart  fails  within  me.  In  vain  do  I  see  cakes 
and  perfumes;  in  vain  do  I  perceive  oils  and  es- 
sences ;  that  which  is  sweet  to  the  mouth  is  now 
bitter  for  me  as  gall. 

"  O  my  beautiful  friend,  my  desire  is  to  become 
thy  wife  and  the  mistress  of  thy  goods ;  my 
desire  is  that  thou  walk  according  to  thy  will 
with  thy  arm  laid  upon  my  arm ;  for  then  I  will 


10 

tell  to  my  heart,  which  is  in  thy  bosom,  my  suppli- 
cations. 

"  If  my  great  friend  cometh  not  during  the  night, 
I  am  as  one  who  is  in  the  grave.  But  thou,  art 
thou  not  health  and  life,  art  thou  not  he  who  trans- 
mits the  joys  of  health  to  my  heart  that  seeks  thee  ? 

"  The  voice  of  the  turtle-dove  is  heard  saying : 
'Behold  the  dawn.  Where  is  my  path?'  Thou, 
thou  art  the  bird,  thou  callest  me,  I  have  found  my 
well-beloved  in  his  chamber,  and  my  heart  is  re- 
joiced, and  I  will  not  escape,  but  hand  in  hand  I 
will  walk  with  thee  and  be  with  thee  in  every 
place,  happy  if  my  well-beloved  make  me  the  first 
of  women,  and  break  not  my  heart. 

"  Ah  !  let  me  go  out,  for  behold  my  well-beloved 
cometh  towards  me.  My  eyes  are  fixed  on  the 
ground  ;  my  ear  listens  to  the  noise  of  his  footsteps 
on  the  road,  for  I.  have  made  the  love  of  my  well- 
beloved  the  unique  object  of  desire,  and  my  heart 
is  never  silent  when  there  is  question  of  him. 

"  But  he  sends  me  a  messenger,  whose  feet  are 
swift  to  come  and  to  go,  to  say  to  me :  '  I  am  not 
free.'  O  thou,  whose  strength  one  never  tires  of 
contemplating,  why  break  the  heart  of  another 
even  unto  death  ? 

"  My  heart  is  so  happy  in  the  hope  of  thy  love 
that  the  front  part  of  my  head-dress  falls  when  I 


11 

hasten  and  run  to  seek  thee,  and  my  chignon  is  in 
disorder.  And  yet  I  assure  thee  that  I  adorn  my 
hair  and  seek  to  make  myself  ready  to  please  thee 
at  all  hours." 

This  elegy  called  forth  applause,  and  the  tender 
chords  of  the  guests  having  been  awakened,  Thou- 
boui  was  encouraged  to  display  the  talent  of  her 
other  singing-women,  and,  at  the  suggestion  of  the 
sentimental  lady  Nophre,  a  song  of  triumphant 
love  was  demanded,  and,  while  dancing-girls  as- 


EGYPTIAN    COJFFUKE 


12 

sumecl  attitudes  to  accompany  the  words,  Poeri  re- 
cited the  "Mirror  of  the  Princess  Hathor  Mou- 
tiritis,"  as  follows : 

"A  palm  of  love  is  the  Princess  Hathor  Mou- 
tiritis,  a  palm  among  men,  a  love  among  women,  a 
palm  of  love  excellent  among  all  women,  a  maiden 
whose  like  has  never  been  seen ! 

"Black  is  her  hair,  blacker  than  the  black  of 
night,  blacker  than  sloes. 

"  Red  are  her  cheeks,  redder  than  the  grains  of 
red  jasper." 

But  before  Poeri  had  finished,  Zari  broke  in  with 
the  "  Floral  Chaplet  of  Love  Triumphant,"  in 
which  each  strophe  begins  with  the  name  of  a 
plant  or  flower : 

"  O  purslam,  my  heart  is  in  suspense  when  I  am 
in  thy  arms !  I  have  used  kohol  to  make  my  eyes 
more  brilliant,  and  I  came  close  to  thee  when  I  saw 
thy  love.  O  master  of  my  heart,  how  beautiful  is 
my  hour  !  It  is  an  hour  of  eternity  for  me  when  I 
rest  with  thee !  My  heart  yearns  towards  thee ! 

"  O  artemisia  of  iny  well- beloved,  in  whose  pres- 
ence one  feels  greater,  I  am  thy  favorite !  To  thee 
I  am  like  the  field  where  I  have  planted  flowers 
and  all  kinds  of  sweet-smelling  plants,  where  I  have 
dug  charming  canals  to  cool  me  when  the  north 
wind  blows,  a  delicious  place  wherein  to  walk,  my 


13 

hand  in  thine,  with  heaving  bosom,  my  heart  full  of 
joy  at  walking  together  we  twain.  The  sound  of 
thy  voice  is  like  strong  wine  to  me,  and  by  hearing 
it  I  live:  to  see  thee,  and  yet  to  see  thee,  is  of  more 
benefit  to  me  than  to  eat  and  to  drink ! 

"O  sweet-marjoram  of  my  well-beloved,  I  took 
thy  garlands  when  thou  earnest  to  me  and  when 
thou  didst  lie  down  in  my  alcove.  .  .  ." 

At  this  point  a  great  commotion  in  the  ante- 
chamber caused  the  singer  to  cease,  and  the  atten- 
tion of  all  was  directed  towards  the  court-yard. 
Preceded  by  his  footmen,  Satni  had  just  arrived  in 
his  new  curricle,  wearing  a  faultless  new  wig,  and 
dressed  writh  all  the  affectation  of  fashion.  Thou- 
bou'i  greeted  the  young  lord  with  her  sweetest  smile 
and  her  most  elegant  compliments  of  welcome,  and 
herself  offered  him  the  blue  lotus  flower  which  he 
would  hold  in  his  hand  during  the  entertainment. 
Then,  all  the  guests  having  arrived,  the  company 
repaired  to  the  dining-room ;  the  slaves  brought  in 
necklaces  of  lotus  flowers  for  each  one ;  anointed 
the  hair  of  the  ladies  and  the  wigs  of  the  gentle- 
men with  perfumes  and  unguents  ;  placed  garlands 
round  their  heads,  and  a  single  full-blown  lotus  so 
attached  that  it  hung  over  the  forehead.  The 
beautiful  Poeri  was  charged  with  anointing  and 
bedecking  Lord  Satni,  and  Thoubou'i  bitterly  re- 


14 

gretted  that  etiquette  did  not  allow  her  to  accom- 
plish these  acts  of  civility  with  her  own  fair  hands. 
But  as  the  feast  advanced  the  Lord  Satni  became 
very  gay  and  loquacious,  and  Thouboui,  keeping  her 
brilliant  eyes  fixed  upon  him,  half  hopeful,  half 
melancholy,  repeated  mentally  the  words  of  the 
"  Elegy  of  Lost  Love  "  : 

"  O  my  beautiful  friend,  my  desire  is  to  become 
thy  wife  and  the  mistress  of  thy  goods.  .  .  .  The 
voice  of  the  turtle-dove  is  heard  saying:  'Behold 
the  dawn.  Where  is  my  path  ?'  Thou,  thou  art  the 
bird,  thou  callest  me,  I  have  found  my  well-beloved 
in  his  chamber,  and  my  heart  is  rejoiced,  and  I  will 
not 'escape;  but  hand  in  hand  I  will  walk  with 
thee,  and  be  with  thee  in  every  place,  happy  if  my 
well-beloved  make  me  the  first  of  women,  and 
break  not  my  heart." 

NOTE. — The  love-songs  intercalated  in  this  sketch  were  deciphered 
by  M.  G.  Maspero  from  the  papyrus  of  Turin  and  the  papyrus  Harris 
No.  500. 


II 

ASIA 

THE  most  ancient  moralist  that  we  know,  the 
Egyptian  Ptahhotpou,  spoke  of  women  as  bundles 
of  mischief  and  bags  full  of  lies  and  wickedness. 
The  testimony  of  the  wall-paintings  of  Thebes,  of 
the  bass-reliefs  of  Louqsor,  and  of  the  antique  pa- 
pyri written  by  the  remote  predecessors  of  Boccac- 
cio and  Sacchetti,  goes  to  show  that  the  ladies  of 
old  Egypt,  with  their  plaited  hair  and  jewelled 
bosoms,  were  ardent  to  attack  and  weak  to  resist. 
Princesses,  daughters  of  the  priestly  class,  or  peas- 
ants, all  resembled  the  wife  of  Potiphar,  if  we  may 
believe  the  ingenious  stories,  the  popular  tales,  and 
the  golden  legends  which  have  for  centuries  amused 
the  ennui  of  the  mummies  in  their  silent  tombs, 
and  which  the  modern  readers  of  hieroglyphics  are 
now  deciphering  for  the  better  comprehension  of 
the  most  ancient  and  perhaps  the  gayest  of  civiliza- 
tions. The  Egypt  of  the  Pharaohs  is  no  longer 
figured  in  our  imagination  as  a  land  of  hieratic  con- 
templation, but  rather,  like  our  own  country,  as  a 


16 

place  of  joy  and  of  tears,  of  hopes  and  of  fears,  of 
illusions  and  emotions — a  land  peopled  by  human 
beings  like  ourselves,  who  laughed,  sang,  loved,  and 
passed.  Modern  erudition  has  even  succeeded  in 
deciphering  love-lyrics  that  were  sung  four  or  five 
thousand  years  ago  on  the  banks  of  the  Nile — lyr- 
ics in  which  the  ancient  Egyptians  expressed  the 
sentiments  that  devoured  them — sometimes  with 
exquisite  sweetness,  at  other  times  with  an  exuber- 
ance and  a  boldness  of  imagination  that  alarm  our 
more  sober  Western  minds.  The  Egyptian  made 
all  nature  participate  in  his  amorous  emotions— 
the  song  of  the  birds,  the  perfume  of  flowers,  the 
murmur  of  the  breeze.  Egyptian  love  is  a  mani- 
festation of  the  joyous  and  splendid  harmony  of 
triumphant  nature,  but  at  the  same  time  it  is  tem- 
pered by  a  veil  of  sadness,  and  by  the  ever-present 
consciousness  of  the  fragility  of  things  and  the 
brevity  of  bliss. 

The  Egyptian  woman  was  almost  the  equal  of 
the  man ;  she  was  free  to  come  and  go,  to  tempt 
and  to  be  tempted,  and  she  made  use  of  her  privi- 
leges. The  land  of  Potiphar's  wife  is  not  the  land 
either  of  the  harem  or  of  the  veil.  It  is  in  the  pal- 
aces of  Assyria  that  we  must  look  for  the  harem. 
It  is  in  the  valleys  of  the  Euphrates  and  the  Tigris, 
in  the  cradle  of  civilization,  that  we  shall  find  the 


17 

veil,  that  emblem  of  modesty  and  submission  which 
jbecame  one  of  the  arms  of  coquetry  almost  as  soon 
las  it  was  invented.  The  first  woman  who  saw  her 
own  image  reflected  in  the  still  waters  of  the  river, 
whether  Pison,  Gihbn,  Hiddekel,  or  Euphrates,  was 
the  first  coquette,  and  when  she  began  to  arrange 
her  hair,  to  smooth  it,  to  hide  it  with  a  veil  or 
shawl,  to  conceal  one  part  of  her  face  and  to  re- 
veal another,  the  art  of  coiffure  was  invented. 

In  the  story  of  Abraham  and  Sarah  we  read  that 
when  the  patriarch  sojourned  in  Gerar,  and  passed 
off  Sarah  as  his  sister  for  fear  lest  the  king  Abime- 
lech  should  slay  him  in  order  to  take  her  from  him, 
Abimelech,  warned  by  a  dream  of  the  wrong  that 
he  was  about  to  do,  restored  Sarah  to  her  husband 
and  gave  the  two  many  presents.  But  before  let- 
ting them  go,  Abimelech  ironically  reproved  Sarah,! 
saying,  "I  have  given  your  brother  a  thousand 
pieces  of  silver,  in  order  that  in  future,  wherever 
you  go,  you  may  always  have  a  veil  to  wear  as  a 
token  to  all  that  you  are  under  the  lordship  of  a 
husband." 

A  thousand  pieces  of  silver  seems  a  large  sum  of  \ 
money  to  spend  on  veils,  but  we  may  suppose  that 
since  Tubal- Cain's  sister  Naamah  first  began  to 
stitch   her  veil  with   colored   threads,  the   art  of 
weaving  fine  muslins  and  precious  cachemire  had 


18 

doubtless  made  great  progress,  and  perhaps  already 
achieved  perfection.  At  any  rate,  the  luxury  of  fine 
linen  and  exquisite  tissues  is  characteristic  of  the 
antique  Asiatic  civilizations.  Therefore  we  may 
suppose  that  among  the  presents  which  Abraham 
sent  to  the  daughter  of  Bethuel — namel}7,  jewels  of 
silver,  jewels  of  gold,  and  raiment — was  included  a 
beautiful  veil,  the  same  which  she  took  and  covered 
herself  with  as  soon  as  she  set  eyes  upon  her  lord 
and  husband,  Isaac,  the  son  of  Abraham.  From 

|  the  narrative  of  the  Bible  we  can  reconstitute  the 
scene  in  all  its  imposing  Oriental  simplicity.  The 
caravan,  composed  of  Abraham's  servant  and  his 
men,  and  Rebekah  and  her  old  nurse,  has  been 
journeying  for  many  days.  Towards  evening  they 
come  near  the  tents,  and  in  the  pastures  outside  the 
encampment  they  see  a  man  standing  alone  and 
meditating.  And  the  man  lifted  up  his  eyes  and 
saw,  and,  behold,  the  camels  were  coming.  At  the 
same  time  Abraham's  servant  recognized  his  mas- 
ter's son,  and,  reining  his  camel  towards  Rebekah. 
he  says  to  the  damsel,  "  Behold  my  master's  son 
Isaac."  Thereupon  Rebekah  gets  down  from  her 
camel,  and  carefully  covers  her  head  with  a  veil  in 

.  token  of  submission,  modesty,  and  respect — a  sym- 
bolism which  has  been  maintained  in  the  bridal 

j  costume  of  the  present  day. 


WOMAN   OF   OULED   NAIL   TRIBE,  ALGERIA 


21 

In  the  days  of  the  temporal  splendor  of  the  Beni- 
Israel  the  habits  of  patriarchal  simplicity  were  lost. 
The  influence  of  Egypt  and  Assyria  and  commer- 
cial relations  with  the  Phoenicians  introduced  lux- 
ury of  all  kinds ;  the  veil  and  the  art  of  embroidery 
no  longer  sufficed  to  adorn  the  heads  of  the  beauti- 
ful Jewesses ;  jewels,  pearls,  and  gold  and  silver 
ornaments  of  the  richest  kind  were  employed  in 
such  abundance  that  the  morose  prophets  broke 
forth  in  threats  and  imprecations.  Thus  Isaiah  in 
a  passage  of  precious  nomenclature  utters  terrible 
menaces : 

"  Because  the  daughters  of  Zion  are  haughty,  and 
walk  with  stretched -forth  necks  and  wanton  eyes, 
walking  and  mincing  as  they  go,  and  making  a 
tinkling  with  their  feet,  therefore  the  Lord  will 
smite  the  heads  of  the  daughters  of  Zion  with  bald- 
ness, and  make  their  bodies  naked,  so  that  they 
shall  be  ashamed.  In  that  day  the  Lord  will  take 
away  the  bravery  of  the  tinkling  ornaments  about 
their  feet,  their  coifs,  their  round  tires  like  the 
moon,  the  ribbons,  the  bracelets,  the  perfume-boxes, 
the  bonnets,  the  ornaments  of  their  legs,  the  ear- 
rings, the  head-bands,  the  finger-rings,  the  nose-jew- 
els, the  changeable  suits  of  apparel,  and  the  mantles, 
and  the  wimples,  and  the  crisping-pins,  the  mirrors, 
and  the  fine  linen,  and  the  hoods  and  the  veils." 


From  this  enumeration  of  objects  we  see  that  the 
Jewesses  frizzled  their  hair  in  front  and  let  it  hang 
down  the  back  in  long  tresses  interwoven  with  rib- 
bons, or  else  they  curled  their  hair  and  let  it  fall  in 
ringlets,  with  a  diadem  to  keep  the  forehead  free, 
or  a  fillet  inlaid  with  jewels,  or  a  net-work  of  gold, 
similar  to  the  coiffure  of  sequins  worn  by  the  Jew- 
esses of  the  East  at  the  present  day.  Again,  from 
the  mention  of  the  bonnet  or  mitra  we  see  that 
Assyrian  fashions  were  in  vogue,  the  mitra  being  a 
sort  of  truncated  cone,  more  or  less  tall,  and  en- 
riched with  gold,  embroidery,  and  precious  stones, 
often  with  a  light  and  rich  veil  thrown  over  the 
whole.  Such  a  coiffure  is  worn  at  the  present  day 
by  the  Persian  and  Caucasian  women,  while  among 
the  Arab  tribes,  whether  in  Egypt,  Morocco,  or  Al- 
geria, the  fashions  in  coiffure  of  thousands  of  years 
ago  still  persist,  with  their  ornaments  of  crowns, 
.turbans,  veils,  and  chains,  and  all  the  refinements  of 
barbaric  luxury  mentioned  by  the  prophet.  Thus, 
due  allowance  being  made  for  facial  type,  we  may 
imagine  to  ourselves  the  Jewish  beauties  of  old 
attired  somewhat  in  the  taste  of  the  women  of  the 
Ouled  Nails,  whose  splendid  and  exuberant  head- 
gear is  familiar  to  the  modern  tourist  in  Algeria, 
and  whose  chains  and  turbans  and  spangled  veils 
add  a  singular  fascination  to  the  flashing  eyes  and 


23 


the  brilliant  complexions  of  the  wearers,  who,  like 
Queen  Esther,  are  ruddy  through  the  perfection  of 
their  beauty,  which  is  generally  heightened  by  a 
touch  of  rouge. 

Isaiah  also  refers  to  the  head-bands  or  precious 
stones  that  hang  over  the  forehead,  an  ornament 
corresponding  to  the  ferroniere  which  was  so  fash- 
ionable in  Europe  during  the  Middle  Ages  and  the 
Renaissance,  and  which  was  happily  revived  during 
the  Romantic  movement  in  the  first  half  of  the 
present  century.  The  same  beautiful  ornament, 
frequently  seen  in  the  portraits  of  Leonardo,  Man- 
tegna,  and  the  great  Venetian  painters,  is  also 
spoken  of  by  the  prophet  Ezekiel  in  these  words 
addressed  to  the  personification  of  Jerusalem : 

"  I  clothed  thee  also  with  broidered  work,  and 
shod  thee  with  badgers'  skin,  and  I  girded  thee 
about  with  fine  linen,  and  I  covered  thee  with  silk. 
I  decked  thee  also  with  ornaments,  and  I  put  brace- 
lets upon  thine  hands  and  a  chain  on  thy  neck, 
and  I  put  a  jewel  on  thy  forehead,  and  ear-rings 
in  thine  ears,  and  a  beautiful  crown  upon  thine 
head." 

So  too  the  virtuous  Judith  braided  her  hair  and 
put  a  tire  or  mitra  upon  her  head  when  she  started 
from  Bethulia  clad  in  garments  of  gladness,  wear- 
ing bracelets,  chains,  ear-rings,  and  all  her  orna- 


24 


ments,  decked  out  bravely  to  allure  the  eyes  of  all 
men  that  should  see  her,  and  more  particularly  to 
fascinate  the  eyes  of  Holofernes.  Likewise  Queen 
Esther,  when  she  entered  the  apadana  of  the  great 
King  Artaxerxes,  had  spared  no  pains  upon  her 
toilet,  but  "  being  gloriously  adorned  she  took  two 
maids  with  her ;  and  upon  the  one  she  leaned  as 
carrying  herself  daintily,  and  the  other  followed, 
bearing  up  her  train.  And  she  was  ruddy  through 
the  perfection  of  her  beauty,  and  her  countenance 
was  cheerful  and  very  amiable ;  but  her  heart  was 
in  anguish  for  fear." 

If  Veils,  diadems,  tiaras,  mitras,  fillets,  crowns ; 
such  are  the  elements  which  the  art  of  coiffure 
owes  to  the  Asiatics,  to  those  nations  who  created 
^the  long-vanished  splendor  of  Nineveh  and  Baby- 
lon, those  cities  of  parks  and  palaces  where  gen- 
erations of  proud  warriors  lived  in  the  ennui  of 
unlimited  luxury  and  fabulous  power.  Of  Assyr- 
ian women,  as  of  the  Jewesses  who  adopted  many 
of  their  fashions,  we  have  but  very  few  graphic 
records.  The  Jews,  from  their  fear  of  the  temp- 
tations of  idolatry,  refrained  from  depicting  the 
human  image.  The  Assyrians,  who  confined  their 
women  within  the  walls  of  the  harem,  treating 
them  as  instruments  of  pleasure  whose  duty  con- 
sisted solely  in  being  beautiful  and  obedient  .to 


WOMAN   OF   OULED   NAIL   TRIBE,   ALGERIA 


their  lord's  caprice,  covered  the  Avails  of  their  pal- 
aces with  representations  of  their  exploits  in  war 
or  in  the  chase,  but  appear  to  have  thought  their 
queens  and  princesses  unworthy,  or  perhaps  too 
sacred,  to  be  exposed  to  the  public  gaze  even  in 
linear  effigy.  However,  from  the  magnificence 
and  the  Complication  of  the  coiffure  of  the  Assyr- 
ian men,  we  may  safely  conclude  that  the  coiffure 
of  the  women  was  no  less  magnificent,  and  in  con- 
firmation of  this  hypothesis  we  may  contemplate  a 
gigantic  slab  of  stone  in  the  Assyrian  transept  of 
the  British  Museum,  on  which  is  carved  a  figure  of 
the  winged  goddess  Ishtar.  This  figure,  discov- 
ered by  Layard  in  the  Northwest  palace  of  Nim- 
rud,  dates  from  the  reign  of  Asshurnazirpal,  884: 
B.  c.,  and  represents  a  goddess  with  four  wings, 
Ishtar  or  Ashtaroth,  holding  a  necklace,  and  wear- 
ing bracelets,  ear-rings,  an  elaborate  series  of  orna- 
ments on  her  bosom,  and  on  her  head  a  paiUu-  or 
bonnet.  The  hair  is  waved  and  frizzed  at  the  ends, 
while  down  the  back  of  the  goddess  hangs  a  waved 
switch  bound  round  with  a  ribbon,  below  which 
the  hair  is  frizzed  or  curled  into  a  ball  adorned 
with  two  silk  tassels. 

So  we  may  figure  to  ourselves  Semiramis,  the 
warlike  queen,  w earing  a  tall  mitra  constellated 
with  jewels  so  brilliant  that  men's  eyes  could  not 


28 

•gaze  upon  it  untroubled ;  so  we  may  imagine  her 
hair  descending  in  spiral  tresses  over  her  scarlet 
peplos  and  glistening  with  gold-dust,  while  in  each 
little  curl  there  lurked  a  pearl,  and  at  the  end  of 
the  torsade  an  infinite  number  of  diamonds  at- 
tached to  the  frizzed  hair  simulated  a  nebula  of 
light  —  as  it  were  a  comet,  of  which  the  torsade 
was  the  tail.  And  over  this  resplendent  coiffure 
was  thrown  a  veil  of  gauze  so  thin  that  it  seemed 
like  a  light  vapor;  but  yet  this  veil  of  mist,  far 
from  dimming  the  brilliancy  of  the  incomparable 
beauty  which  it  enveloped,  enhanced  it  still  more, 
for  the  gauze  was  bespangled  with  rubies  andL.diac_ 
monds  so  that  the  sight  of  it  wras  like  the  starry 
heavens,  and  the  poets  compared  their  magnificent 
queen  to  the  shimmering  effulgence  of  the  galaxy 
whose  countless  stars  no  mage  has  ever  numbered. 


Ill 

ATHENS 

THE  sculptor  Euphorion  had  arrived  earlier  than 
usual  at  his  studio  in  the  Street  of  the  Fig  Trees, 
near  the  Temple  of  Theseus.  It  was  high  midsum- 
mer ;  the  heat  was  excessive,  and  Euphorion  in  his 
uneasy  slumber  had  dreamed  that  a  terrible  acci- 
dent had  befallen  thfe  bass-relief  which  he  was 
modelling  for  the  rich  Roman  collector  Lucius 
Crassus.  In  his  sleep  Euphorion  had  seen  the  clay 
begin  to  steam  ;  then  gradually  the  composition 
disappeared  behind  a  veil  of  vapor ;  and  when  the 
vapor  vanished  in  turn  there  remained  of  the  work 
nothing  but  the  iron  framework  or  backing  of  the 
bass-relief  on  the  stand,  and  a  conical  mound  of 
dust  on  the  floor.  Such  was  the  force  of  the  heat 
that  it  had  literally  dried  and  pulverized  the  model- 
ling cl&y  and  annihilated  the  labor  of  many  weeks. 

Euphorion  awoke  in  a  cold  perspiration,  and  as 
the  sun  was  alread\r  above  the  horizon,  he  girded 
up  his  tunic,  hurried  out  of  his  house,  and  hastened 
across  the  city  of  Athens  to  his  studio  as  fast  as 


32 

his  legs  could  carry  him.  "If  by  some  mischance 
the  dream  should  prove  to  be  true !  What  a  hor- 
rid nightmare !"  thought  the  sculptor  to  himself  as 
he  walked,  and  from  time  to  time  ran.  with  the 
early  scavenging  dogs  at  his  heels  as  he  passed. 
"  Accursed  dream  of  evil  omen!  Although  Glycon 
of  Cos,  the  Sophist,  maintains  that  we  must  inter- 
pret dreams  contrariwise.  Perhaps  some  messen- 
ger of  the  gods,  Lord  Eros  himself,  maybe,  has 
come  secretly  by  night  to  finish  my  figure.  .  .  ." 

Meanwhile  Euphorion  had  reached  the  end  of 
the  Street  of  the  Fig  Trees,  where  his  studio  was 


VENUS   OF   GNIDOS   WITH   THE   DOUBLE   FILLET 


33 

situated,  and  after  turning  the  key  with  feverish 
anxiety  he  flung  open  the  door,  and  behold  the 
bass-relief  was  intact,  just  as  he  had  left  it  on  the 
previous  evening!  On  the  left  hand  were  the  two 
ladies,  and  on  the  right  Melitta  roughly  sketched 
in  with  the  cage  full  of  little  Cupids  at  her  feet. 
Thank  Heaven !  The  dream  was  but  an  empty 
dream. 

However,  Euphorion  proceeded  to  take  the  usual 
precautions.  He  went  out  into  the  garden  to  draw 
water  from  the  well,  and  with  a  whisk  of  laurel 
branches  he  sprinkled  the  clay  with  fresh  spray, 
and  carefully  placed  wet  rags  on  the  parts  where 
he  had  not  to  work  that  day.  ''Let  us  hope  that 
Lucius  Crassus  will  be  pleased,"  said  Euphorion  to 
himself.  "  The  subject  is  perhaps  too  amiable,  too 
frivolous,  too  much  in  the  taste  of  the  day.  How- 
ever, Lucius  wishes  to  have  it  in  terra-cotta,  and 
not  in  eternal  marble.  It  will  be  but  an  ephemeral 
work,  and  the  Muses  will  pardon  me,  seeing  that  I 
have  done  my  best.  And,  after  all,  I  am  not  re- 
sponsible if  Eros,  the  great  lord  of  Love,  has  be- 
come the  plaything  of  rhetoricians  and  story-tellers, 
and  sculptors  too,  like  me,  who  have  to  work  to 
please  the  rich  Komans.  Let  the  Muses  hold  Anac- 
reon  guilty,  and  not  me." 

"  Hail,  Euphorion !     All  hail !     May  the  Muses 


34 


guide  your  chisel,  and  grant  that  your  servant 
Melitta  may  do  nothing  which  is  not  agreeable, 
and  say  nothing  but  that  which  is  pleasing!" 

Euphorion  turned  with  a  smile  of  welcome  at 
the  sound  of  these  words  of  greeting  and  of  suave 
presage,  and  replied : 

"  Hail,  Melitta !  All  hail,  most  beautiful  of  Mile- 
sian models,  and  most  exact— nay,  more  than  ex- 
act, for  it  is  not  yet  the  hour." 

"  True,"  answered  Melitta,  entering  the  room ; 
"  but  Cheiron,  the  baker,  told  me  that  he  saw  you 
running  along  the  street  just  now,  so  I  knew  that 
you  must  be  here  and  ready  to  work." 

"  Sweet  Melitta,  I  came  in  wild  haste  before  the 
hour  because  I  had  a  terrible  dream  this  night." 
And  Euphorion  related  to  the  girl  his  strange  night- 
mare, at  which  she  laughed  lightly  and  mocked  the 
sculptor.  Meanwhile  she  took  off  her  petasos — a 
flat  straw  hat  with  a  round  brim  and  a  little  conical 
crown — untied  the  fillet  that  bound  her  chignon, 
and  let  her  blue-black  hair  float  over  her  shoul- 
ders. 

"  How  do  you  wish  me  to  arrange  my  hair  ?" 
asked  Melitta,  ready  to  assume  the  necessary  post- 
ure as  the  sculptor  might  desire. 

"  This  morning,"  said  Euphorion,  "  we  are  going 
to  work  on  the  figure  of  the  woman  selling  Loves. 


35 

You  must  sit  on  a  stool  with  the  cage  before  you. 
You  have  just  opened  the  door  and  let  out  one  lit- 
tle winged  Love.  Your  costume  is  good.  Your 
hair  must  be  arranged  simply— 

"  "With  a  wreath  of  flowering  ivy  leaves,  like  the 
Muse  Thalia?" 

"  No,  no  ;  quite  simply." 

"  Then  tied  in  a  bow  on  the  top,  with  a  small 
chignon  on  the  nape,  and  tresses  over  the  shoul- 
ders?" 

"  No,  that  is  too  ornate  even  for  a  seller  of  Loves. 
Tie  your  hair  in  a  simple  chignon,  with  the  wavy 
tresses  carried  back  rather  loosely,  just  covering 
the  tops  of  the  ears,  and  bound  with  a  double  fillet, 
the  coiffure  of  Kypris  and  of  Artemis,  the  chaste 
huntress." 

"  The  very  good  and  very  'beautiful  goddess,  as 
the  Athenians  have  engraved  on  the  pedestal  of 
her  statue,"  added  Melitta,  as  she  arranged  her 
hair  with  the  aid  of  a  bronze  mirror  which  Eu- 
phorion  held  before  her,  performing  the  functions 
of  a  handmaiden.  "  There  !  One  more  hair-pin ! 
Ah!  Can't  I  wear  a  diadem  ?" 

"  No,  Melitta ;  respect  the  purity  of  the  contour 
of  your  pretty  head.  To-day  we  want  neither  dia- 
dems nor  crowns,  nor  veils  nor  turbans,  nor  cyl- 
indrical Asiatic  coiffures,  nor  Cypriote  curls  row 

3 


THE  MUSE  THALIA 


above  row,  with  high  chignon,  but  simply  the 
noble  and  severe  ^Athenian  coiffure,  which  the 
great  sculptors  of  old  have  immortalized." 

"You  would  not  have  much  success  as  a  ladies' 


A  QUEEN  WITH  THE  CYPRIOTE  CURLS 


39 

hair-dresser,  Euphorion,  for  I  can  see  that  you  con- 
demn all  the  new  fashions." 

"That  is  possible,  Melitta,"  replied  the  sculptor, 
as  he  began  to  work  on  his  bass-relief.  With  nim- 
ble fingers  and  the  enthusiasm  of  happy  labor, 
Euphorion  pursued  his  task  for  a  long  while  in 
silence,  and  Melitta  sat  listening  to  the  chirping 
of  the  cigales,  carefully  retaining  the  pose  in 
which  she  had  been  placed.  Then,  still  working 
with  his  clay,  Euphorion  resumed  an  interrupted 
train  of  thought,  and  said,  as  much  for  his  own 
satisfaction  as  for  Melitta's  benefit : 

"We  Hellenes  have  always  been  admirers  of 
pure  beauty  discreetly  adorned,  but  not  sacrificed 
to  its  own  adornment.  In  the  days  of  the  Median 
wars  the  Spartans  were  the  finest  men  in  Greece, 
and  their  wives  and  daughters  the  handsomest 
women ;  indeed,  so  great  was  their  physical  per- 
fection that  all  the  Greeks,  even  we  Athenians,  ac- 
cepted generals  from  among  them  without  mur- 
muring. The  Spartans  were  the  masters  of  the 
Hellenes  in  gymnastics  and  noble  dancing,  and 
although  they  themselves  never  excelled  in  the 
arts,  it  is  nevertheless  to  them  that  we  Athenians 
owe  our  artistic  excellence,  more  especially  our  ex- 
cellence in  sculpture ;  for  without  the  perfection 
which  gymnastics  give  to  the  body  we  should  have 


40 


had  no  beautiful  models  to  sculp.  Kemember  the 
story  of  Agesilaos,  who,  in  order  to  encourage  his 
soldiers,  had  some  Persian  prisoners  stripped  be- 
fore them.  When  they  saw  the  white  and  flabby 

flesh  of  the  Asiatics, 
undeveloped  and  un- 
perfected  by  gymnas- 
tics, the  Hellenes  burst 
out  laughing,  and 
marched  onward  full 
of  disdain  for  such 
an  effeminate  enemy. 
Our  Hellenic  women 
of  old  had  inborn  taste 
and  elegance,  and  in 
spite  of  new-fangled 
Asiatic  fashions,  our 
Athenian  ladies— 

" — dye  their  hair  blue,  my  dear  Euphorion," 
broke  in  Melitta--"  blue  like  the  sky,  blue  like  the 
sea,  blue  with  rose  reflections  like  the  breast  of  a 
dove ;  they  powder  their  hair  with  gold  and  white 
and  red ;  they  paint  their  eyebrows  like  the  Asiat- 
ics ;  they  wear  their  semi-transparent  robes  like  the 
Asiatics ;  they  curl  their  hair  with  irons ;  they 
wear  nets  of  golden  cords,  diadems  inlaid  with 
precious  stones,  wigs,  veils,  high  coiffures.  Eu- 


A    VENUS   WITH    THE   BOW 


41 


phorion,  dear  master,  you  are  not  in  the  move- 
ment." 

"And  you,  Melitta,  you  are  too  much  in  the 
movement,  for  I  would  wager  from  the  sight  of 
those  dark  circles  under  your  eyes  that  you  went 
to  sup  last  night  with  some  young  lord  in  company 
with  Sophists  and  poetasters  and  hetairas,  your 
countrywomen  from  Miletus." 

"  You  have  the  power  of  divination  of  a  .Del- 
phian seer,  Euphorion.  I  did  sup  at  the  house  of 
Charicles  of  Alexandria,  a  rich  young  stranger  who 
has  lately  come  to  Athens  to  spend  his  patri- 
mony ;  at  least  so  says  Cleon  the  Cynic.  Charicles 
loves  the  poets  and  the  story-tellers.  He  has  a 
beautiful  manuscript  of  the  Milesian  tales  of  Aris- 
tides." 

"  And  after  supper,  I  suppose,  you  listened  to 
that  corrupt  and  frivolous  literature?"  asked  Eu- 
phorion, with  indignation. 

"  Yes,  dear  master,"  replied  Melitta,  with  win- 
ning effrontery,  "and  we  all  enjoyed  the  stories 
immensely.  Oh !  do  not  be  angry.  We  listened 
to  some  pieces  by  Meleager  also,  your  favorite 
Meleager.  Dorothea  recited  them.  Oh !  if  you 
could  have  seen  her,  Euphorion,  with  her  hair 
floating  loose  in  the  Corinthian  style,  a  little  cap  of 
scarlet  silk  on  the  top  of  her  head,  and  a  fringe  of 


LEKANE  FOUND  AT  KERTCH 


gold  medallions  all  round.  She  looked  charming, 
and  she  recited  some  verses  that  I  never  heard  be- 
fore. Listen,  Euphorion :  '  My  cup  has  smiled  with 
joy.  Why  ?  Because  it  has  touched  the  eloquent 
mouth  of  Zenophile.  Happy  cup !  Would  that  its 
lips  might  drink  up  my  soul  at  one  draught !' ?: 

"  And  about  his  mistress,  Heliodora,  has  Me- 
leager  written  nothing  new?"  asked   Euphorion. 


43 

"  Dorothea  has  received  nothing  new  from  her 
friend,  the  Tyrian  Sebta  ?" 

"  Yes,  yes,  a  sweet  madrigal,"  replied  Melitta. 
"  Listen :  '  I  will  Avreathe  white  violets.  I  will 
wreathe  the  soft  narcissus  with  green  myrtle.  I 
will  wreathe  the  laughing  lily  and  the  suave  crocus, 
the  blue  hyacinth  and  the  rose  dear  to  Eros,  that 
all  may  form  a  crown  of  beauty  to  deck  the  grace 
of  Heliodora's  hair.' ': 

"  It  is  a  dainty  piece  indeed,"  said  Euphorion, 
approvingly,  "  and  your  young  lips  pronounce  be- 
comingly those  flowery  words.  Enough.  Let  us 
rest  awhile.  Here  are  honey  cakes  and  wine.  Go 
gather  some  grapes  from  the  vine  that  shades  the 
doorway,  for  the  noonday  heat  is  fierce,  and  my 
hands  are  slack  to  mould  the  clay.  Go,  Melitta, 
sweet  flower  of  Miletus." 

And  Melitta  rose  from  the  bench  on  which  she 
had  been  sitting,  and,  taking  up  her  hat,  she  put  it 
on  her  head  to  protect  herself  from  the  hot  sun. 
But  as  she  passed  she  saw  on  the  table  a  cu- 
rious lekane,  or  flat  cup  with  a  cover,  on  which 
were  painted  scenes  connected  with  the  toilet :  a 
lady  dressed,  wearing  the  himation  which  covers 
the  lower  part  of  her  face,  is  waiting  for  her  com- 
panion who  is  examining  her  coiffure  in  a  mirror ; 
two  ladies  who  have  just  been  bathing,  attended 


44 

by  Loves  and  tire- women;  a  young  woman,  over 
whose  abundant  hair  an  attendant  is  pouring  per- 
fumed water ;  another  woman  seated  resignedly  on 
a  stool  while  a  companion  dresses  her  carefully 
combed  hair;  a  woman  twisting  her  hair  into 
switches  while  two  others  stand  and  watch  her. 

"What  a  beautiful  cup!"  exclaimed  Melitta. 
"  Give  it  to  me,  Euphorion,  and  I  will  be  your 
model  for  a  year— for  two  years !" 

"Alas,  Melitta,  it  is  not  mine  to  give.  It  is  an 
antique  cup  three  hundred  years  old,  which  Lucius 
Crassus  bought  when  he  was  in  Athens  last  spring. 
He  left  it  in  my  care,  together  with  this  perfume- 
bottle  in  the  form  of  Aphrodite  Anadyomene  ris- 
ing from  the  sea." 

Melitta  took  the  bottle  in  her  hands,  admired 
the  cordon  of  pearls  passing  over  the  bosom  of  the 
figure,  the  rich  necklace,  the  crown  with  its  gilt 
rosettes  placed  so  delicately  on  the  curled  hair,  the  j 
dark  blue  of  the  eyes,  the  gold  of  the  crown,  of  the 
hair,  and  of  the  necklace,  and,  above  all,  the  red  of 
the  inside  of  the  shell  setting  off  the  roseate  pearli- 
ness  of  the  flesh. 

"  Oh,  Euphorion,  what  an  exquisite  bottle !  Would 
that  it  were  mine !  Would  I  were  rich !  How 
happy  must  she  be  who  enjoys  the  favor  of  Lucius 
Crassus !" 


45 


With  a  sigh  and  a  wistful  look  at  the  precious 
objects,  Melitta  went  forth  to  gather  grapes,  and 
when  she  returned  she  sat  down  in  silence,  and 


APHRODITE    ANADYOMENE 


dreamily  nibbled  a  honey  cake  in  front  of  Eu- 
phorion.  After  a  while  Melitta,  looking  shyly  at 
the  sculptor,  said, 


46 

"  Lucius  Crassus  is  coming  back  to  Athens  soon, 
is  he  not  3" 

u  Yes  ;  on  his  way  from  Alexandria  to  Rome." 

"From  Alexandria?  Then  perhaps  he  knows 
Charicles  ?" 

"  Doubtless." 

"  He  will  go  to  sup  with  Charicles.  I  shall  see 
him,  perhaps.  Oh,  if  I  only  had  beautiful  apparel, 
some  Tyri.an  veils,  and  a  jewelled  diadem  like  Doro- 
thea!" 

"  Melitta,  you  are  allowing  your  mind  to  revel  in 
the  romantic  intrigues  dear  to  Aristides  the  Mi- 
lesian. I  read  your  thoughts.  I  divine  your  vault- 
ing ambition.  You  would  fain  set  the  snares  of 
your  young  beauty  in  the  path  of  Lucius  Crassus. 
For  shame,  Melitta,  for  shame !" 

"  Pardon,  Euphorion,"  replied  the  blushing  Me- 
litta. "I  was  but  joking." 

"  Nay,  so  was  I  joking  too,  Melitta.  Go  your 
wanton  ways,  and  may  Kypris  and  Eros  protect 
you.  Life  is  but  a  span.  Be  gay,  be  joyous  and 
happy  while  you  may,  for,  as  the  poet  says : 

1 ' '  Short  is  the  rose's  bloom  ;  another  morn 
No  rose  is  there:  you  find  instead  a  thorn.'" 


IV 
ROME 

IT  was  in  the  spring  of  the  year  A.D.  208:  Ter- 
tullian  had  recently  bidden  farewell  to  the  brethren 
in  Carthage,  his  native  town,  and  had  settled  in 
Rome,  with  a  view  to  taking  part  in  the  contro- 
versy between  the  partisans  of  Praxeas  and  those 
of  Montanus  that  was  then  agitating  the  Roman 
Church.  For  the  moment,  however,  he  had  not 
declared  himself,  although  he  had  no  hesitation  in 
sympathizing  with  the  rigidly  ascetic  principles  of 
the  Montanists,  rather  than  with  the  lax  and  indul- 
gent views  of  those  who  were  not  disposed  to  look 
upon  the  world  as  a  monastic  association,  or  upon 
the  practice  of  Christianity  as  a  perpetual  struggle 
against  human  nature.  Meanwhile  the  great  pole- 
mist,  comfortably  lodged  in  the  house  of  a  deacon 
of  the  Church,  Proxenes,  who  in  former  years  had 
been  a  steward  in  the  employ  of  the  good  emperor 
Marcus  Aurelius,  was  reading  the  epistles  of  St. 
Paul  and  making  notes  for  one  of  his  minor  trea- 
tises, De  Cultu  Feminarum. 


48 


The  first  battle  was  about  to  be  fought  between 
Christian  piety  and  the  spirit  of  worldliness,  be- 
tween monasticism  and  society,  between  renuncia- 
tion and  the  joy  of  living.  Tertullian,  accustomed 

as  he  was  to  the  luxury 
of  Carthage,  had  never- 
theless been  scandalized 
by  the  still  greater  lux- 
ury of  Rome,  and  espe- 
cially by  the  splendor 
of  the  costume  and  the 
personal  ornaments  of 
the  Roman  ladies,  whose 
example  appeared  to  him 
to  be  exercising  a  dis- 
astrous influence  upon 
many  Christian  women. 
Therefore  the  moment 
seemed  to  him  oppor- 
tune to  determine  once  for  all  what  was  the  be- 
coming costume  for  Christian  widows,  deacon- 
esses, wives,  and  virgins,  and  with  this  object  he 
was  copying  his  texts.  First  of  all,  the  precepts  of 
St.  Paul  in  his  Epistle  to  Timothy,  where  he  says 
that  Christian  women  should  adorn  themselves  "  in 
modest  apparel,  with  shamefacedness  and  sobriety ; 
not  with  broidered  hair,  or  gold,  or  pearls,  or  costly 


DANCING-WOMAN  WITH  SIMPLE 
FILLET 


49 

array" ;  and  then  the  passage  in  the  Epistle  to  \ 
the  Corinthians,  where  St.  Paul  requires  Christian  \ 
women  to  wear  their  hair  covered  with  a  veil,  say- 
ing :  "  Judge  in  yourselves :  Is  it  comely  that  a 
woman  pray  unto  God  uncovered  ?  Doth  not  even 
nature  itself  teach  you,  that  if  a  man  have  long 
hair,  it  is  a  shame  unto  him?  But  if  a  woman  have 
long  hair,  it  is  a  glory  to  her ;  for  her  hair  is  given 
her  for  a  covering."  Finally  St.  Paul,  in  order 
to  cut  short  all  objections,  states  categorically  that 
the  Church  insists  upon  women  being  veiled.  It  is 
not  the  Christian  custom,  he  says,  for  women  to 
wear  their  hair  uncovered.  "  But  if  any  man  seem 
to  be  contentious,  we  have  no  such  custom,  neither 
the  churches  of  God." 

The  traditions  established  by  the  early  Christians 
restored  the  use  of  the  simple  opaque  veil,  forming 
a  sort  of  hood  in  place  of  any  complicated  architect- 
ure of  plaits  and  chignons,  and  it  was  generally1 
accepted  that  matrons  must  wear  veils  in  church 
and  in  all  religious  assemblies.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  girls  and  the  unmarried  women  seem  to  have  re- 
belled instinctively  against  a  custom  which  obliged 
them  to  hide  a  portion  of  the  arms  of  beauty. 
Hence  arose  the  question  of  the  veiling  of  vir- 
gins, which  Tertullian  was  about  to  treat.  And 
taking  up  his  tablets,  he  began  to  compose  his 


50 


argument,  beginning  with  a  vigorous  reprimand  of 
•those  weaker  sisters  who  were  worldly  enough  to 
disregard  the  precepts  of  St.  Paul  and  who  re- 
fused to  wear  veils.  "  They  abandon  the  head- 
dress of  childhood,"  he  wrote,  "  but  only  to  consult 
their  looking-glasses,  to  soften  their  skin  with 
essences,  and  perhaps  even  to  paint  their  faces. 
They  wear  mantles  and  different  kinds  of  shoes,  and 
they  have  altogether  the  look  of  married  women, 
except  that  they  wear  their  hair  without  the  cov- 
ering of  a  veil,  in  order  to  display  the  elegance  of 
their  coiffure  and  captivate  the  eyes  of  men.  But 
the  mind  of  a  virgin  ought  not  to  be  concerned 
with  pleasing  men.  At  every  age  there  is  danger. 
Clothe  yourselves  with  the  arms  of  modesty ;  for- 
tify yourselves  with  the  rampart  of  modesty ;  sur- 
round your  head  with  a  wall  that  will  guarantee 
you  against  the  attacks  of  others." 

Tertullian  paused  and  read  over  what  he  had 
written,  but  without  satisfaction.  True  these  were 
but  notes  which  his  ardent  African  eloquence 
would  vivify  and  adorn  with  sharp  touches.  He 
would  speak  also  of  the  error  of  the  married 
women,  whose  irrepressible  coquetry  had  invented 
caps  and  diminutive  bonnets  of  fine  linen,  wrhich 
they  wore  instead  of  the  real  veil  that  covers  and 
conceals  the  hair.  Nevertheless,  Tertullian  felt 


DANCING-WOMAN  WITH  RINGLETS  IN  FRONT 


53 

that  his  brain  was  heavy,  and  that  his  prose  did 
not  flow  easily.  The  literary  man  began  to  criti- 
cise the  polemist.  The  brilliant  pupil  of  the  rheto- 
ricians of  Carthage  reasserted  himself  in  the  person 
of  the  grave  and  ascetic  doctor.  The  subject  of 
woman  and  the  ornaments  of  woman  had  sufficed 
to  fill  him  with  a  desire  to  treat  it  with  graceful- 
ness of  language  and  with  all  the  art  of  the  accom- 
plished rhetorician,  for  in  reality  Tertullian,  mighty 
genius,  vigorous  thinker,  and  vehemently  ascetic 
Christian  as  he  was,  remained  throughout  his  life 
an  incorrigible  man  of  letters,  a  literary  artist 
delighting  in  ingenious  metaphors,  refined  erudi- 
tion, and  subtle  phraseology. 

And  so  Tertullian  began  to  reflect,  and  to  recall 
to  mind  the  methods  and  precepts  of  the  literary 
schools  of  Carthage,  whereas  in  similar  circum- 
stances a  Christian  doctor  of  less  scholastic  training 
would  have  simply  prayed  for  inspiration,  or  merely 
plodded  along  in  a  commonplace  but  sincere  argu- 
ment. The  more  Tertullian  thought  about  his  sub- 
ject, the  less  ascetic  his  thoughts  became,  and  the 
stronger  his  curiosity.  "  In  order  to  present  my 
argument  vigorously,"  he  reasoned  to  himself,  "  I 
must  be  armed  with  instances ;  I  must  have  an 
abundance  of  recent  observation ;  I  must  refresh 
those  souvenirs  of  worldly  frivolity  which  I  ac- 

4 


54 


quired  in  the  days  when  I  was  still  unregenerate. 
I  will  go  and  take  a  walk  through  the  streets  and 
observe  the  fashions,  so  that  my  prose  will  gain  in 
color  and  sharpness.  I  need  a  good  deal  of  descrip- 
tion in  this  treatise." 

Tertullian  laid  aside  his  tablets  and  started  to  go 
out,  but  at  the  door  of  the  house  he  met  his  host, 
Proxenes,  and  being  yet  unfamiliar  with  the  habits 
of  Roman  society,  he  explained  to  him  his  embar- 
rassment and  asked  for  advice.  Where  could  he 
see  the  fashionable  ladies  ?  "Where  could  he  conven- 
iently get  information  about  the  artifices  of  coif- 
fure and  toilet  ? 

Proxenes,  whose  ascetic  ardor  was  less  violent 
than  that  of  Tertullian,  and  whose  attitude  towards 
the  pagans  was  conciliatory  rather  than  aggressive, 
gave  the  Carthaginian  doctor  some  hints  for  his 
guidance  through  the  streets,  and  gradually  becom- 
ing himself  interested  in  the  subject,  he  bethought 
himself  of  a  man  who  would  be  of  the  greatest  use 
to  Tertullian,  one  Apicius  Naso,  formerly  jeweller 
to  the  Enlpress  Faustina,  and  one  of  those  profess- 
ors of  hair-dressing  who  trained  the  slaves  of  the 
rich  Roman  ladies,  and  taught  them  the  theory  and 
practice  of  coiffure.  Naso,  now  advanced  in  life 
and  wealthy,  had  remained  deeply  interested  in  the 
arts  to  which  he  owed  his  fortune.  Although 


EMPRESS  FAUSTINA 


57 

practising  the  ancient  religion,  he  was  a  good  and 
gentle  man,  liberal-minded,  a  Platonist  in  philosoph- 
ical opinions.  Proxenes  had  known  him  when  he 
was  in  the  service  of  Marcus  Aurelius.  If  Tertul- 
lian  had  no  objection,  Proxenes  would  introduce 
him  to  Naso. 

Tertullian  accepted  the  offer  with  joy,  and  the 
doctor  and  the  deacon  hastened  through  the 
crowded  streets,  crossed  the  river,  and  pursued 
their  way  to  a  villa  in  the  outskirts  of  the  city, 
where  Apicius  Naso  lived  in  a  forest  of  roses.  The 
old  jeweller  welcomed  Tertullian  to  his  home  with 
every  mark  of  honor,  saying  that  he  should  feel 
greatly  flattered  to  show  his  frivolous  collection  of 
feminine  ornaments  to  so  profound  a  scholar  and 
so  pious  a  teacher  of  virtue. 

Thereupon  Apicius  led  the  way  into  a  long  gal- 
lery lined  with  pedestals,  on  which  were  placed 
marble  busts  of  famous  Roman  ladies,  the  flesh  and 
the  draperies  delicately  tinted,  while  the  hair  and 
the  ornaments  were  likewise  colored  discreetly. 
There  was  the  Empress  Faustina,  the  wife  of  An- 
toninus Pius,  wearing  an  exquisite  coiffure  of 
waved  hair,  a  simple  fillet,  and  a  high-placed  chig- 
non of  braids  coiled  on  the  crown ;  Didia  Clara, 
with  low  chignon  and  hair  waved  in  the  Greek 
style ;  Julia,  daughter  of  Titus,  with  a  high 


58 

chignon  and  a  mass  of  little  curls  surrounding  the 
forehead ;  the  same  Julia  with  a  round  chignon  of 
plaits,  a  tall  frontal  of  small  curls  rising  like  a  dia- 
dem above  the  head,  small  regular  curls  round  the 
forehead,  and  in  front  of  each  ear  three  small  ring- 
lets. Julia  Aquilia  Severa,  with  her  hair  parted 
in  the  middle  and  falling  in  heavy  loops,  caught 
up  and  tied  over  the  nape ;  Domitia,  with  her 
hair  frizzled  into  an  infinite  number  of  curls  all 
over  her  head  ;  a  head  of  Juno,  with  waved  hair, 
a  diadem,  a  chignon,  and  a  string  of  amber  beads 
passing  in  front  of  the  diadem  and  falling  be- 
hind the  ears,  with  ringlets  coiled  around;  and 
many  other  busts  with  beautiful  or  eccentric  coif- 
fures, while  at  the  end  of  the  gallery  were  two 
statues  of  dancing-women,  one  with  short  ringlets 
and  a  simple  fillet  binding  the  head,  and  the 
other  with  short  ringlets  in  front  and  long  ring- 
lets behind,  the  head  being  likewise  bound  with 
a  fillet.  All  these  busts  Tertullian  examined  with 
curiosity,  as  Apicius,  playing  with  a  ball  of  pure 
rock-crystal,  that  he  used  in  the  Eastern  man- 
ner to  keep  his  hands  cool  and  fresh,  explained  to 
him  the  characteristics  of  the  coiffure  ;  the  manner 
of  setting  the  diadems  in  the  hair ;  the  different 
systems  of  plaiting,  curling  with  irons,  waving  and 
frizzling  hair ;  the  methods  of  making  bows  of  hair 


61 

and  of  interweaving  plaits  with  strings  of  pearls ; 
the  various  shades  of  blond  and  red  hair  which 
came  into  fashion  after  the  conquest  of  the  Ger- 
mans ;  the  caustic  soap  and  dyes  used  to  change 
the  color  of  the  hair;  the  manufacture  of  wigs 
and  false  chignons,  and  the  fickleness  of  fashion. 
In  proof  of  this  latter  phenomenon,  Apicius  called 
the  attention  of  Tertullian  to  the  fact  that  the 
coiffure  of  several  of  the  busts  in  his  collection  was 
movable,  so  that  when  the  fashion  changed  a  new 
coiffure  could  be  substituted  in  place  of  the  old 
one,  and  the  lady  be  spared  the  grief  of  seeing  a 
portrait  of  herself  not  absolutely  a  la  mode,  or  so 
obviously  old-fashioned  that  it  would  give  disas- 
trous information  regarding  her  age.  Finally,  Api- 
cius pointed  out  the  bust  of  a  lady  tastefully  veiled, 
with  just  a  little  of  the  hair  visible  around  the  fore- 
head, a  concession  to  coquetry  which  matrons  some- 
times abused.  "  This  coiffure,  with  a  veil  com- 
pletely concealing  the  hair  and  falling  over  the 
shoulders,  is  that  of  the  Vestal  Virgins,"  added 
Apicius.  "  It-is  the  ideal  Roman  coiffure,  and  the 
model  which  the  typical  Roman  matron  affects  to 
imitate." 

Apicius  then  showed  Tertullian  a  series  of  combs 
of  box-wood  and  of  ivory  daintily  carved,  various 
kinds  of  curling-irons,  and  many  models  of  long 


hair-pins  used  to  hold  the  coiffure  in  position,  some 
of  them  having  a  hole  at  each  end,  through  which 
the  fillet  was  passed  and  tied.  The  heads  of  these 
pins  were  curiously  chiselled  in  the  form  of  figures 
and  groups  of  Yenus  and  Cupid,  Cupid  and  Psyche, 
Isis,  and  other  subjects.  Apicius  showed  one  pin 
which  was  a  hollow  tube  destined  to  contain  poi- 
son, and  remarked  with  a  smile  that,  as  a  collector, 
he  would  be  glad  to  believe  that  this  was  the  pin 
with  which  Cleopatra  poisoned  herself,  but,  as  a 
jeweller,  he  was  unable  to  forget  that  he  had  had 
the  pin  manufactured  for  a  Corinthian  hetaira,  who 
had  left  it  on  his  hands. 

Apicius  next  opened  a  case  of  drawers,  in  each 
of  which  was  a  mirror  of  polished  metal,  the  mir- 
ror side  of  silver,  the  back  <5f  gold  chased  in  ad- 
mirable designs  and  set  around  with  precious 
stones.  Then  he  showed  toilet-cases  in  silver,  fans, 
bracelets,  necklaces,  cameos,  ear-rings,  and  orna- 
ments of  gold,  explaining  the  variations  of  Roman 
taste  in  jewelry,  and  affirming  his  conviction  that 
in  the  matter  of  ornaments,  as  of  coiffure,  the  true 
models  were  to  be  sought  in  the  inventions  of  the 
Athenians  and  the  Corinthians ;  "  for  our  Roman 
ladies,"  he  said, "  though  insatiable  in  the  pursuit  of 
novelty  and  ingenious  in  the  imagination  of  luxury, 
are  not  always  remarkable  for  their  artistic  taste." 


VESTAL    VIRGIN 


65 


After  some  further  talk  with  Apicius  about  the 
luxury  of  women,  Tertullian  and  Proxenes  took 
leave  of  the  amiable  specialist,  and  returned  through 
the  city,  both  the  doctor  and  the  deacon  feeling 
their  powers  of  observation  mightily  sharpened,  so 
far  as  concerned  feminine  elegance,  by  the  explana- 
tions and  illustrations  which  Apicius  had  submitted 
to  them.  Tertullian  stopped  to  look  in  all  the 
shops  where  ladies'  ornaments  and  attire  were  dis- 
played, and  Proxenes  from  time  to  time,  good  dea- 
con as  he  was,  could  not  refrain  from  marvelling 
at  the  splendor  of  some  beauty  or  another  that 
passed  them,  reclining  in  a  litter  borne  by  Cappa- 
docian  slaves.  Proxenes  even  ventured  to  suggest 
to  Tertullian  that  it  would  be  a  hard  thing  for  the 
Church  to  conquer  the  luxury  of  the  world,  and 
that  perhaps  the  Church  would  make  more  prose- 
lytes by  indulgence  than  by  rigorism.  But  the 
Carthaginian  was  so  absorbed  in  his  literary  reflec- 
tions, and  in  the  mental  trituration  of  all  the  ob- 
servations that  he  had  just  made,  that  he  did  not 
combat  the  backsliding  opinions  which  Proxenes 
had  expressed,  but,  answering  him  evasively,  hur- 
ried along,  and  as  soon  as  they  reached  the  house 
thanked  Proxenes,  retired  to  his  room,  and  resumed 
his  polemical  prose  with  renewed  ardor  at  the  point 
where  he  had  left  it  a  few  hours  before.  And  as 


66 

Apicius's  remarks  about  paint  and  hair-dyes  and 
their  consequences  were  uppermost  in  his  mind,  he 
proceeded  to  write : 

"I  see  some  women  who  are  all  the  time  occu- 
pied with  applying  washes  to  their  hair  to  give  it 
a  blond  color.  They  seem  to  be  almost  ashamed 
of  their  father-land,  and  to  blush  with  regret  be- 
cause they  were  not  born  in  Gaul  or  Germany.  A 
sad  presage  is  this  coiffure,  a  vain  and  gloomy 
beauty  which  at  last  ends  in  ugliness.  Is  it  not 
true  that  by  the  use  of  these  washes  and  perfumes 
women  gradually  lose  their  hair  ?  Is  it  not  a  fact 
that  their  brains  are  affected  by  these  strange  lo- 
tions, and  by  the  excessive  heat  of  the  sun  to  which 
they  expose  their  hair  to  dry  it?  A  Christian 
woman  makes  her  head  a  sort  of  altar,  on  which 
she  pours  libations  of  perfumery  in  profusion. 

"  *  See,'  they  say, '  how  we  change  white  or  black 
hair  into  blond,  so  that  it  may  look  more  beautiful ' ; 
and  there  comes  a  time  when  they  spare  no  pains 
to  change  their  white  hair  into  black  when  they 
have  reached  fatal  old  age,  and  are  full  of  desola- 
tion because  they  have  lived  too  long. 

"  Of  what  avail  for  salvation  is  this  wearisome 
care  that  you  take  to  adorn  your  head  ? 

"  What !  Cannot  you  leave  your  hair  in  peace  ? 
At  one  time  you  are  curling  your  hair,  at  another 


JULIA,  DAUGHTER   OF   TITUS 


69 


you  are  uncurling  it.  At  one  time  you  are  lifting 
it  up,  and  at  another  you  are  letting  it  down.  One 
day  you  braid  your  hair,  and  the  next  day  you  let 
it  float  over  your  shoulders  with  affected  negligence ; 
and  then  another  day  you  load  your  head  with  an 
enormous  heap  of  false  hair,  which  you  arrange  in 
the  form  of  a  bonnet  to  imprison  your  head,  or  in 
the  form  of  a  pyramid  so  as  to  show  the  neck  un- 
covered. No  one,  says  Jesus  Christ,  can  add  any- 
thing to  what  he  is,  and  yet  you  would  add  some- 
thing by  piling  up  on  your  head  tufts  of  hair  loaded 
with  ornaments  like  the  boss  of  a  shield.  If  you 
do  not  blush  through  the  weight  of  this  burden,  at 
least  you  must  blush  for  its  unworthiness.  Do  not 
place  upon  a  head  that  has  been  sanctified  by  bap- 
tism the  remains  of  some  wretch  who  has  died  in 
debauchery,  or  of  some  criminal  who  has  expiated 
his  crimes  on  the  scaffold.  May  it  please  God  that 
on  the  day  when  the  Christians  triumph,  I,  un- 
worthy as  I  am,  may  be  permitted  to  raise  my 
head  to  your  proud  height,  that  I  may  see  if  you 
come  to  life  again  with  your  paint,  your  rouge, 
your  perfumes,  and  your  superb  hair." 

At  this  moment  Proxenes  came  into  the  room, 
followed  by  his  daughter  Priscilla,  who  carried 
on  a  tray  the  frugal  repast,  which  was  all  that 
the  austere  Tertullian  allowed  himself — bread,  len- 


70 

tils,  cheese,  and  fruit.  And  Proxenes  held  a  manu- 
script in  his  hand,  the  Book  of  Enoch,  and  respect- 
fully begging  the  permission  of  his  illustrious  guest, 
he  called  his  attention  to  the  enumeration  of  the 
chiefs  of  those  angels  who  united  themselves  with 
the  daughters  of  men,  and  begot  giants,  each  three 
hundred  cubits  high.  "  These  giants  devoured  all 
the  work  of  man,  until  they  could  not  be  satiated," 
read  Proxenes  from  his  scroll.  "  Then  they  turned 
against  men  to  devour  them.  And  they  began  to 
put  to  death  beasts,  reptiles,  and  fish,  and  to  eat 
their  flesh  and  drink  their  blood.  Then  the  earth 
reproved  the  unjust.  Azaziel  taught  men  to  make 
swords,  shields,  and  corselets ;  he  taught  them  to 
make  mirrors  and  bracelets  and  ornaments,  and 
the  usage  of  perfumes,  and  of  precious  stones  of  all 
colors.  Impiety  increased,  shamelessness  waxed 
greater,  and  all  transgressed  and  walked  in  the  path 
of  corruption." 

"  Yes,  my  good  Proxenes,"  answered  Tertullian, 
"  the  only  garment  that  befits  woman  is  mourning, 
for  it  was  through  woman  that  sin  came  into  the 
world ;  and  you,  Priscilla,  beware  of  the  evil  ex- 
ample of  those  of  your  sex  who  walk  about  with 
their  heads  uncovered,  and  wear  silk  dresses  with 
many  plaits  that  rustle  as  they  walk,  who  have 
their  necks  adorned  with  many  rows  of  pearls,  and 


DIDIA   CLARA. 


73 


their  arms  decked  with  bracelets  like  the  pagan 
priestesses  of  Bellona  and  Ceres.  Hands  that  are 
accustomed  to  bracelets  are  not  strong  to  bear  the 
weight  of  chains.  Legs  that  have  been  swathed 
with  bands  of  silk  will  scarcely  be  able  to  endure 
the  pain  of  shackles.  A  head  covered  with  emer- 
alds and  diamonds  will,  I  fear,  bow  basely  beneath 
the  sword  of  martyrdom  with  which  we  are  threat- 
ened at  every  hour." 


THE  MIDDLE   AGES 

THE  object  desired  in  the  arrangement  of  hair 
may  be  either  beauty  or  richness,  artistic  comeli- 
ness or  barbaric  splendor,  charm  obtained  by  means 
of  the  elements  which  nature  provides,  or  magnifi- 
cence due  to  the  profusion  of  extraneous  ornaments. 
The  most  admirable  coiffures  of  the  Greek  and  the 
Roman  civilizations  are  the  simplest.  The  natural 
chignon,  the  waved  hair  bound  with  a  narrow  fillet, 
or  at  the  utmost  adorned  with  a  diadem  —  such  is 
the  ideal  and  such  the  artistic  standard  to  which 
fashion  returns  century  after  century,  whenever  its 
vagaries  become  excessive  and  end  in  ridicule  or  in- 
convenience. The  progress  of  fashion  is  from  too 
little  to  too  much,  from  simplicity  to  extravagance, 
from  no  ornament  at  all  to  ornament  that  overpow- 
ers everything  else.  The  moment  an  ornament 
comes  into  use  its  importance  begins  to  grow,  and 
continues  growing  until  its  luxuriance  overwhelms 
and  entirely  conceals  what  it  was  originally  in- 
tended to  adorn.  One  jewel  in  the  hair  attracts 


75 

another  and  another;  a  golden  diadem  invites  a 
crown,  and  a  crown  suggests  a  helmet  enriched 
with  diamonds  and  precious  stones ;  even  the  veil, 
the  emblem  of  modesty,  destined  to  conceal,  is 
made  a  flag  and  a  banner  of  coquetry,  and  in  its 
various  and  innumerable  transformations  it  becomes 
wimple,  turban,  coif,  or  bonnet,  and  in  the  end  a 
mere  pretext  for  ornamentation. 

The  contrast  with  the  artistic  simplicity  of 
Greek  and  Eoman  fashion  is  furnished  by  the  stiff 
garments  of  heavy  silk  embroidered  with  pearls, 
precious  stones,  and  ornaments  of  gold  and  colored 
glass  which  were  invented  by  Byzantine  taste,  and 
by  the  prodigious  coiffures  worn  by  the  Empress 
Theodora  and  her  suite,  as  depicted  in  the  famous 
mosaics  of  Ravenna.  Byzantine  fashion  left  scarce- 
ly any  hair  visible.  The  head  was  loaded  with 
pads  and  rolls  of  rich  stuffs  embellished  with  pearls 
and  precious  stones,  on  the  top  of  which  were  worn 
heavy  crowns  writh  pendeloques  of  pearls.  The 
neck  and  bosom  were  loaded  with  chains  of  gold 
enriched  with  precious  stones.  The  very  shoes 
were  embroidered  with  pearls.  In  short,  Byzan- 
tine taste,  which  is  generally  considered  to  be  bad 
taste,  carried  to  the  extreme  point  the  research  for 
splendor  and  magnificence,  and  dressed  women  to 
look  like  Oriental  idols.  Nevertheless,  it  must  not 


76 

be  forgotten  that  in  the  civilization  of  modern 
Europe  Byzantine  art  played  a  great  and  beneficent 
role ;  it  inspired  and  guided  that  taste  for  luxury 
and  that  desire  of  beauty  which  produced  the  ar- 
chitecture of  medieval  Italy,  and  gave  conscious- 
ness to  the  artistic  Renaissance  in  the  time  of  Char- 
lemagne. 

The  history  of  hair-dressing  in  Europe  begins  with 
long  tresses  floating  over  the  shoulders  and  held  in 
placa-by  a  simple  head-band.  The  next  step  is  the 
division  of  the  tresses  by  a  parting,  and  the  plait- 
ing and  lacing  of  each  switch  with  ribbon  so  that  it 
forms_ajope.  These  two  ropes  may  hang  in  front 
of  the  wearer,  or  over  the  shoulders  and  down  the 
back.  Then,  again,  the  two  switches  produced  by 
the  parting  may  be  gathered  into  one  long  braided 
pigtail,  as  is  shown  in  the  accompanying  illus- 
tration, which  is  a  portrait  of  a  lady  by  Piero 
della  Francesca  (1415-92).  Furthermore,  the  two 
primitive  switches  may  be  coiled  up  or  otherwise 
arranged  at  the  sides,  at  the  back,  or  on  the  top  of 
the  head.  Finally,  ornamentation  is  obtained  by 
the  development  of  such  elements  as  are  contained 
in.  veils,  coifs,  jewels,  and  crowns. 

The  picture  by  Piero  della  Francesca,  although 
it  is  of  the  fifteenth  century,  will  serve  perhaps 
better  than  more  archaic  works  to  explain  the 


PORTRAIT  OF  A  LADY,  BY  PIERO  BELLA  FRANCESCA 


79 


progression  above  indicated.  Let  us  see  how  this 
coiffure  is  executed.  First  of  all,  the  hair  is  parted 
in  the  middle  of  the  head,  and  so  hangs  in  flow- 
ing tresses  like  a  veil  over  the  shoulders  and  back. 
If  the  coiffure  were  destined  to  remain  thus,  some 
fillet,  circle,  or  diadem  would  be  needed  to  keep 
the  hair  in  place  and  prevent  it  falling  over  the 
eyes.  Hence  the  crowns  or  "chapels,"  used  by 
both  men  and  women,  which  we  see  represented 
in  mediaeval  sculpture  and  in  the  miniatures  of  the 
twelfth,  thirteenth,  and  fourteenth  centuries.  As 
for  the  crowns,  properly  so  called,  they  were  worn 
in  the  Middle  Ages  by  kings,  princes,  and  counts 
only,  and  their  form  varied  according  to  the  fan- 
cy of  the  maker  and  the  wearer,  there  being  no 
difference  between  men's  crowns  and  women's 
crowns  except  in  size.  The  heraldic  crowns,  such 
as  they  are  classed  nowada}^s,  were  not  formally 
distinguished  until  the  sixteenth  century.  Girls, 
both  noble  and  other,  and  those  women  whose 
rank  did  not  allow  them  to  wear  crowns,  wore 
gold  or  silver  circles,  either  of  plain  metal  or  else 
enriched  with  enamel,  precious  stones,  or  orna- 
ments. Furthermore,  the  use  of  crowns  of  natu- 
ral flowers,  common  to  Greek  and  Roman  antiq- 
uity, persisted  until  the  time  of  the  Renaissance, 
as  we  read  in  the  romance  of  Lancelot,  who  wore 


80 

a  chaplet  of  fresh  roses  on  his  head  every  day  of 
the  year  except  on  Fridays  and  on  the  eve  of  great 
fetes,  "  il  ne  fut  jour  ou  Lancelot,  ou  hiver  ou  ete, 
n'eust  au  matin  un  chapel  de  fresches  roses  sur  la 
teste,  fors  seulement  au  vendredi  et  aux  vigilles 
de  hautes  festes."  This  custom  suggested  to  the 
goldsmiths  a  dainty  device  for  "  chapels,"  whereby 
they  wrought  flowers  of  gold,  which  were  sewn 
on  a  band  of  ribbon  or  galloon.  Precious  stones 
and  jewels,  too,  were  sewn  on  galloon  in  like  man- 
ner, and  so  the  "chapel"  of  the  lady  depicted  by 
Piero  della  Francesca  is  composed  of  a  narrow 
fillet  of  velvet,  to  which  are  attached  thirteen  ame- 
thysts, one  of  which  occupies  the  centre  of  her 
forehead.  Finally  the  fillet  was  shorn  of  all  orna- 
ment except  one  precious  stone  or  jewel,  which  it 
served  merely  to  fix  in  the  centre  of  a  limpid  brow. 
Thus  in  Mantegna's  portrait  of  the  Duchess  Eliza- 
beth Gonzaga  we  see  in  the  centre  of  the  forehead 
a  jewelled  scorpion,  emblem  of  logic,  while  a  simi- 
lar isolated  jewel  is  worn  by  Lucrezia  Crivelli  in 
her  portrait  in  the  Louvre  by  Leonardo  da  Yinci, 
commonly  known  as  "  La  Belle  Ferronniere  "- 
the  name  of  a  "chapel"  of  this  kind  being  in 
French  ferrojzniere.  The  usage  of  the  ferronniere 
was  revived  in  the  beginning  of  the  present  cen- 
tury, when  the  Eomantic  movement  in  art  wras  at 


81 


its  height,  and  a  charming  example  is  given  in 
our  illustration,  engraved  from  an  exquisite  lith- 
ograph by  Grevedon  (1783-1849).  The  lady  por- 
trayed by  Grevedon  wears  her  ferronniere  high 
on  account  of  the  chignon,  the  position  of  which 
necessarily  determines  the  inclination  of  the  fil- 
let or  circle.  The  fillet,  too,  is  rather  wide. 
"With  a  low  chignon  the  fillet  would  bind  the  head 
horizontally,  and  the  jewel  would  then  fall  in  the 
centre  of  the  forehead.  However,  the  usage  of 
the  ferronniere  seems  to  be  thoroughly  consecrated 
by  the  traditions  of  adornment  of  beauty,  and  it 
is  strange  that  the  women  of  the  present  day  have 
rarely  ventured  to  revive  the  fashion.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  is  true  that  piquant  and  unquiet 
beauty  could  not  wear  a  ferronniere.  This  orna- 
ment requires  calm  and  regular  features  and  dig- 
nity of  gesture  and  attitude ;  it  is  the  ornament 
of  that  fair  bride  of  whom  Matthew  Arnold  says  : 

"  On  her  front  did  glow 

Youth  like  a  star  ;  and  what  to  youth  belong — 
Gay  raiment,  sparkling  gauds,  elation  strong." 

But  to  return  from  this  digression  to  the  por- 
trait by  Piero  della  Francesca.  Having  parted 
the  hair,  and  left  the  front  tresses  sufficiently  loose 
to  cover  the  ears,  we  tie  the  two  switches  together 


above  the  nape  of  the  neck,  and  proceed  to  plait 
the  pigtail  and  bind  it  round  with  ribbons.  Then, 
in  order  to  hide  the  parting  at  the  back  of  the 
head,  we  place  a  little  coif  of  richly  ^embroidered 
samite,  constructed  on  a  wire  frame,  and  adorned 
_with  two  heavy  jewels  and  droppers,  which  take 
the  place  of  ear-rings.  These  jewels  were  perhaps 
mounted  on  pins,  which  would  in  that  case  serve 
to  hold  the  coif  in  position,  in  addition  to  the  cir- 
cle or  "chapel"  that  completes  the  coiffure.  In 
the  embroidered  cap  and  the  rich  jewelry  used  in 
this  example  we  remark  the  remnants  of  Byzan- 
tine influence,  which  became  so  powerful  in  Eu- 
rope in  the  twelfth  century,  when  the  crusades 
placed  the  West  into  close  and  constant  communi- 
cation with  the  East,  and  brought  into  fashion  the 
rich  tissues  and  elaborate  ornaments  not  only  of 
the  Byzantines,  but  also  of  the  Arabs. 

Another  portrait  by  Piero  della  Francesca,  that 
of  the  Duchess  of  Urbino,  in  the  Uffizi  Gallery  at 
Florence,  will  enable  us  to  comprehend  the  ar- 
rangement of  the  primitive  switches  at  the  sides 
of  the  head.  This  coiffure  is  simple  in  theory,  but 
somewhat  complex  in  execution.  First  of  all  the 
short  hair  at  the  edge  of  the  cheeks  is  reserved 
and  carefully  curled  with  an  iron.  The  long  hair 
is  parted  in  the  middle  and  behind  so  as  to  form 


A  LADY  WITH  A  FE11RONNIERE 


85 


two  switches,  one  on  each  side,  and  each  switch  is 
bound. round  with  ribbon,  the  end  alone  being  left 
loose.  The  switch  thus  bound  is  coiled  and  fixed 
with  a  brooch,  behind  which  the  loose  end  floats. 
The  division  of  the  hair  obtained  in  this  way 
leaves  a  parting  visible  at  the  back  of  the  head, 
and  in  order  to  conceal  this  feature,  and  also  in 
order  to  re-establish  the  contour  destroyed  by  the 
displacement  and  compression  of  the  volume  of 
hair,  a  veil  is  fixed  so  as  to  form  a  sort  of  arti- 
ficial chignon  and  to  fall  over  the  neck.  Finally, 
a  rich  jewel,  like  a  diminutive  crown,  is  attached 
on  the  top  of  the  head  to  a  ribbon,  which  ap- 
pears to  pass  behind  the  ears  and  be  connected 
with  a  fine  cord  that  is  seen  under  the  lady's 
chin.  Every  detail  of  this  coiffure  is  rich  and 
rare,  and  the  ensemble  is  worthily  completed  by 
the  magnificent  carcanet  and  pendant  of  precious 
stones  that  clasps  the  neck  and  falls  over  the 
bosom. 

To  follow  the  transformations  of  the  veil  which 
was  so  strongly  recommended  by  St.  Paul  and  Ter- 
tullian  would  lead  us  into  endless  developments. 
The  theme  is,  indeed,  curious  and  interesting,  and 
those  who  would  write  a  complete  history  of  coif- 
fure need  to  study  it  with  minuteness.  Such, 
however,  is  not  our  object;  we  have  no  preten- 


sions  to  write  a  history  of  coiffure,  but  merely  to 
select  from  artistic  monuments  examples  of  coif- 
fure and  ornament  that  remain  stamped  with  the 
eternal  imprint  of  style ;  our  business  is  with  what 
is  beautiful  rather  than  with  what  is  curious,  and 
our  design  is  to  present  to  the  fair  reader  not  the 
results  of  archaeological  research,  but  the  suggest- 
ions for  elegance  contained  in  visions  of  feminine 
beauty  and  character  selected  from  among  the 
great  works  of  the  art  of  the  past.  In  the  history 
of  feminine  coiffure  there  is  to  be  noted  a  perpet- 
ual and  inevitable  hostility  between  the  ornament 
and  the  thing  adorned,  between  the  hair  and  the 
veil  and  its  developments,  between  the  natural 
elements  of  coiffure  and  the  artificial  elements. 
The  tendency  of  ornament  is  to  spread  and  mo- 
nopolize. The  veil,  destined  to  conceal,  is  grad- 
ually made  transparent,  and  finally  abolished,  un- 
til one  day  it  reappears  in  a  diminutive  and 
insidious  form,  and  once  more  grows  and  grows, 
until  its  monopoly  has  yet  again  to  be  destroyed, 
and  the  hair  delivered  from  its  prison-house.  Thus, 
in  the  Middle  Ages,  the  veil  in  the  form  of  men- 
tonnieres,  gorgieres,  and  guimpes  gradually  enker- 
chiefed  the  hair,  and  concealed  it  entirely,  produc- 
ing, on  the  one  hand,  those  close  coiffures  of  which 
the  souvenir  remains  in  the  costume  of  the  various 


THE    DUCHESS   OF   URBINO 


89 

orders  of  nuns  and  sisters  of  mercy,  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  voluminous  escqffions  and  the  high- 
peaked  hennins  or  steeple  head-dresses,  which 
formed  as  it  were  rich  cushions  and  gay  masts, 
whereon  floating  veils  were  displayed  and  rigged. 
Yet  other  developments  of  the  veil  are  nets,  which 
were  used  for  centuries  in  ancient  Rome,  and  re- 
vived in  the  fashions  of  the  Middle  Ages.  We 
may  even  venture  to  consider  the  capuchon  or 
hood  to  be  a  development  of  the  veil,  for  in  its 
simplest  form  the  hood  is  a  primitive  veil  or  man- 
telet tied  round  the  neck  under  the  chin  so  as  to 
protect  the  head.  Evidently  we  could  call  atten- 
tion to  innumerable  forms  of  hoods,  hennins,  and 
escqffions  that  are  quaint,  amusing,  graceful,  and 
even  suggestive ;  but  with  few  exceptions  these 
coiffures  are  so  exceptional,  so  ephemeral,  and  gen- 
erally so  eccentric  that  the  study  of  them  would 
lead  us  away  from  our  subject  into  the  too  fasci- 
nating domain  of  archaeological  curiosity.  It  will 
suffice  for  us  to  remember  that  the  veil  and  the 
hood  have  finally  gained  semi  -  independence,  and 
that  nowadays,  in  the  form  of  hats  and  bonnets, 
they  are  the  province  of  the  milliner  rather  than 
of  the  hair -dresser  proper.  While  formerly  the 
coiffure  of  a  lady  was  essentially  the  same  in-doors 
and  oat -doors,  nowadays  a  lady,  when  she  goes 


90 

out,  adds  to  her  ordinary  coiffure  the  additional 
ornaments  which  her  milliner  provides.  The 
Duchess  of  Urbino  walked  in  the  streets  with  her 
hair  dressed  as  we  see  it  in  her  picture.  The  lady 
with  a  pigtail,  whose  portrait  we  have  reproduced, 
also  went  abroad  with  no  other  head-gear  than  her 
diadem  and  her  embroidered  cap,  which  is,  how- 
ever, an  embryo  bonnet.  But  a  hundred  years 
later  the  two  girls  whom  Bernard  van  Orley 
(1490-1560)  painted  at  pra}Ter  with  their  moth- 
er, as  we  see  in  a  grand  picture  in  the  Brussels 
Museum,  wore  regular  bonnets,  which  Avould  re- 
quire small  change  in  order  to  adapt  them  to  the 
modern  taste. 


PORTRAIT    OF  TWO   GIRLS,  BY    BERNARD    VAN    ORLEY 


VI 
FLORENCE 

IN  his  famous  book  The  Courtier,  that  flower  of 
sixteenth  -  century  culture,  the  Count  Baldassar 
Castiglione  maintains  that  the  courtier,  or,  as  we 
should. now  say,  the  well-educated  man  or  the  per- 
fect gentleman,  ought  to  have  some  skill  in  paint- 
ing, not  only  because  it  is  a  noble  art,  attended 
with  much  credit  and  advantage,  but  because  it 
helps  him  to  judge  of  the  excellency  of  statues, 
both  ancient  and  modern,  of  vessels,  buildings, 
medals,  engravings,  -and  such  like,  and,  above  all 
things,  because  it  gives  him  a  better  taste  and 
knowledge  of  living  beauty,  not  only  in  the  sweet- 
ness of  the  countenance,  but  in  the  just  proportion 
of  all  the  parts,  as  well  in  men  as  in  all  other  ani- 
mals. "  You  see,  then,"  continues  our  author, 
"  that  the  knowledge  of  painting  is  the  occasion  of 
an  infinite  deal  of  pleasure,  which  they  may  frame 
some  guess  of  who  view  and  enjoy  the  beauty  of 
some  fair  one  to  that  degree  that  they  imagine 
themselves  in  Paradise;  and  this  without  the 


94 


knowledge  of  painting,  which  had  they  but  ac- 
quired, it  would  mightily  enhance  their  satisfac- 
tion ;  for  then  they  would  more  perfectly  un- 
derstand the  beauty  which  raises  such  pleasing 
transport  in  their  breasts." 

This  excellent  advice  applies  to  the  adornment 
of  beauty  as  well  as  to  beauty  itself.  A  knowl- 
edge of  painting,  and  more  particularly  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  noblest  pictures  that  the  world  has 
produced,  mightily  enhances  the  satisfaction  of 
those  who  delight  in  the  adornment  of  beauty,  be- 
cause it  enables  them  more  perfectly  to  under- 
stand and  more  successfully  to  pursue  their  ideal. 
As  beauty  is  a  gift  worthy  of  sedulous  cultivation, 
so  is  the  adornment  of  beauty  a  subject  that  de- 
mands and  repays  minute  study ;  and  the  best 
text-books  in  which  such  study  may  be  made  are 
surely  statues  and  pictures,  for  none  have  devoted 
more  thought  and  invention  to  adorning  the  beau- 
ty of  women  than  sculptors  and  painters.  As 
there  are  several  sorts  of  beauty,  a  woman  ought 
to  know  what  dress  best  becomes  her.  So  Cas- 
tiglione  ingeniously  remarks  that  if  she  perceives 
herself  to  be  a  gay  and  sprightly  beauty,  "  she 
ought  so  to  accommodate  her  gestures,  words,  and 
clothes  as  may  all  contribute  to  heighten  the 
charms  of  it.  In  the  same  manner  let  her  who  is 


95 


of  a  mild  and  grave  temperament  by  all  suitable 
ways  improve  what  nature  has  given  her.  So, 
likewise,  whether  she  be  fatter  or  leaner  than  or- 
dinary, or  fair 'or  brown,  let  her  use  the  assistance 
of  dress,  but  let  all  art  therein  be  concealed  as 
much  as  possible ;  let  her  appear  easy  and  genteel, 
without  any  affectation  or  taking  pains."  This 
again  is  good  advice,  and  a  knowledge  of  pictures 
will  greatly  help  a  woman  to  take  advantage  of  it- 
More  especially  will  the  study  of  painting  educate 
her  eye  to  the  appreciation  of  harmony  of  colors, 
of  grace  of  line,  of  elegance  of  silhouette,  and  of 
dignity  of  bearing. 

A  woman  whose  memory  possesses  the  por- 
traits of  Vandyck,  Titian,  and  Bronzino  can  never 
consent  to  be  badly  dressed,  however  simple  and 
inexpensive  her  garments  may  be.  The  haunt- 
ing souvenir  of  the  female  figures  of  Luini, 
Leonardo,  and  Botticelli  is  a  sure  preservative 
against  awkward  gestures,  ungraceful  bearing,  and 
want  of  suavity  of  all  kinds.  The  frequenta- 
tion  of  the  noble  painters  of  Italy,  Flanders, 
and  France  is  an  encouragement  to  look  upon 
the  adornment  of  beauty  not  as  a  matter  of  vanity, 
much  less  as  the  business  of  the  Tempter,  accord- 
ing to  the  ideas  of  the  ascetics,  but  rather  as  a 
manifestation  of  culture,  a  triumph  of  civilization, 


like  the  transformation  of  the  simple  eglantine 
into  the  resplendent  rose. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  are  partisans  of  beauty 
unadorned.  That  fascinating  but  often  self-con- 
tradictory thinker,  Ernest  Renan,  remarking  the 
total  absence  of  jewels,  and  even  of  flowers,  in  the 
traditional  adornment  of  the  women  of  his  native 
Brittany,  has  written  a  curious  page  to  express  his 
disapproval  of  the  use  of  ornaments  altogether. 
With  antique  nudity,  this  philosopher  argues,  jew- 
elry had  a  raison  d'etre,  and  Greece,  taking  advan- 
tage of  certain  errors  of  the  East,  ventured  to 
cope  with  that  most  delicate  problem  of  adorning 
the  masterpiece  of  nature — a  truly  beautiful  wom- 
an. But  in  our  cold  climates,  and  with  the  cur- 
rent ideas  of  Christian  modesty,  jewelry  is  out  of 
place.  What  have  these  ornaments  of  savages 
and  Bedouines  to  do  with  the  one  and  only  im- 
portant thing,  namely,  the  sweetness  and  inno- 
cence of  the  looks  ?  Can  virtue  and  candor  be  ex- 
pressed by  jewels  ?  Has  there  ever  been  invented 
a  jewel  for  the  eyes?  It  is  true  there  is  the  odious 
henne ;  but  has  a  woman  who  respects  herself  ever 
used  henne  ?  What  a  horrible  idea  it  is  to  blacken 
the  golden  balustrade  of  the  celestial  Jerusalem, 
and  to  defile  the  edges  of  that  sacred  fountain  in 
the  depths  of  which  we  see  God  and  his  paradise ! 


97 


M.  Renan  goes  even  further,  and  protests  against 
color  in  the  service  of  beauty,  maintaining  that 
black  and  white  suffice,  because,  better  than  all 
ornaments,  they  leave  room  for  dreams  of  amorous 
and  veiled  flesh.  But  enough  of  paradoxes.  The 
practice  of  humanity  from  time  immemorial  speaks 
in  favor  both  of  color  and  adornment,  and  it  is  in 
these  conditions  that  the  greatest  artists  have  al- 
ways represented  beauty.  So  far  as  concerns  the 
ways  of  arranging  women's  hair,  no  artists  have  at 
any  time  shown  themselves  so  various  as  the  Ital- 
ian painters  of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centu- 
ries, more  especially  Piero  della  Francesca,  Sandro 
Botticelli,  Leonardo  da  Yinci,  Titian,  Bronzino,  and 
the  other  great  Venetians.  Doubtless  it  may  be 
urged  that  in  those  days,  when  fashion  varied  not 
only  from  one  country  to  another,  but  from  one 
province  and  even  from  one  town  to  another,  a 
painter  could  never  be  at  a  loss  for  models.  It  is 
true  that  Italian  women,  like  Italian  men,  enjoyed 
complete  liberty  in  the  arrangement  of  their  hair ; 
there  was  no  one  fashion  to  which  all  conformed, 
as  is  more  or  less  the  case  in  the  civilized  world 
of  to-day ;  on  the  contrary,  absolute  license  reigned 
in  the  domain  of  fashion ;  but  such  was  the  artis- 
tic instinct  of  this  favored  epoch  that  taste  never 
had  to  suffer  from  excess  of  liberty.  Neverthe- 


98 

less,  the  coiffures  that  were  invented  by  the  native 
genius  of  coquetry,  or  by  the  imaginings  of  rival 
milliners,  were  certainly  not  the  only  source  from 
which  the  painters  drew  inspiration.  On  the  con- 
trary, the  painters  were  themselves  the  chief  pro- 
fessors of  the  art  of  coiffure,  and  the  very  greatest 
devoted  much  attention  to  the  invention  of  beauti- 
ful arrangements  and  adornments  for  the  hair  of 
their  models.  Thus  Vasari,  speaking  of  Leonardo 
da  Vinci's  admirable  skill  in  drawing,  mentions 
with  enthusiasm  "some  heads  of  women  whose 
coiffures  were  so  graceful  and  beautiful  that  Leo- 
nardo always  imitated  them" — coiffures  which  we 
may  be  sure  were  composed  by  Leonardo  himself, 
for  the  drawings  in  question  still  exist  to  charm 
us  by  their  absolute  beauty  and  complete  origi- 
nality. 

One  of  these  drawings  at  Florence  represents 
the  favorite  Milanese  type  which  Leonardo  has 
immortalized  in  his  picture  of  the  Virgin  and  St. 
Anne,  the  hair  falling  in  rolling  waves,  almost  in 
ringlets,  over  the  shoulders,  the  shorter  front  locks 
finely  crimped,  and  brushed  forward  over  the 
cheeks  so  as  to  conceal  the  ears,  a  small  veil  cover- 
ing the  nape,  and  on  the  top  of  the  head  a  flat 
chignon  of  coiled  braids  bound  round  with  a  broad 
band  or  plaited  fillet,  over  which  is  a  diadem  with 


HEAD   OF   A   GRACE   BY  BOTTICELLI 


101 

a  circular  jewel  or  ferronniere  in  the  centre  flanked 
by  small  wings,  while  on  each  side  above  the  ear 
two  bunches  of  frizzed  hair  escape  from  beneath 
the  band,  and  from  the  summit  of  the  chignon  an- 
other bunch  of  feathery  hair  rises  like  a  natural 
aigrette.  In  the  Museum  of  Venice  another  head 
by  Leonardo  is  represented  with  a  crown  or  fillet 
of  vine  branches  and  leaves,  and  the  hair  falling  in 
anrple  ringlets  on  each  side  of  the  head  below  the  fil- 
let. In  the  Ambrosian  Library  at  Milan  is  a  drawing 
by  Leonardo  of  a  very  simple  coiffure  in  which  the 
hair  is  parted  in  the  middle  ;  from  the  front  tresses 
are  taken  wherewith  to  make  three  triple  plaits 
or  braids,  the  first  one  starting  on  a  level  with  the 
eyebrows,  the  one  behind  it  a  little  lower,  and  the 
third  one  a  little  lower  still ;  then  these  three  braids 
are  looped  up  one  above  the  other  and  tied  at  the 
back  of  the  head,  thus  holding  in  position  the  long 
hair  that  falls  in  waves  behind  over  the  neck. 
Other  drawings  at  Vienna,  or  in  the  royal  collec- 
tion at  Windsor,  show  exquisite  arrangements  of 
braided  hair  covered  or  draped  with  transparent 
veils,  and  finally  at  Windsor  there  is  a  large 
drawing  and  four  sketches  of  a  singular  coiffure 
which  seems  to  have  greatly  fascinated  Leonardo. 
The  suggestion  evidently  came  from  the  head  of 
the  Gorgon  Medusa,  with  horrors  armed  and  curls 


FROM  A  DRAWING  BY  LEONARDO  DA  VINCI 


of  hissing  snakes,  as  Homer  has  described  her  in 
his  Odyssey.  Leonardo,  however,  has  suppressed 
the  horror,  and  retained  only  a  strange  serpentine 
arabesque,  which  forms  the  leitmotiv  of  this  com- 
position of  interwoven  braids  and  floating  locks, 


103 


one  of  the  most  fantastic  and  complicated  that  the 
artist  invented,  yet  not  more  complicated  than 
many  coiffures  that  may  be  seen  in  the  portraits 
and  pictures  of  the  time. 

Beauty  and  originality  of  coiffure  play  a  great 
role  in  the  paintings  of  Sandro  Botticelli  (1447- 
1510).  In  his  picture  of  "  Calumny,"  painted  from 
Lucian's  description  of  a  picture  by  Apelles,  doubt- 
less as  translated  by  the  artist's  friend  and  adviser 
Leone  Battista  Alberti,  a  scene  of  hair-dressing 
forms  one  of  the  incidents.  Alberti's  translation 
runs  thus : 

"  There  is  a  personage  with  long  ears  with  two 
women,  one  on  each  side,  namely,  Ignorance  and 
Superstition.  Calumny  advances  in  the  form  of  a 
beautiful  woman,  whose  face,  however,  is  hardened 
by  cunning.  In  her  left  hand  she  holds  a  lighted 
torch,  and  with  the  other  hand  she  drags  along  by 
the  hair  a  young  man  who  lifts  up  his  hands  heav- 
enward. Her  guide  is  a  pale,  hideous  man  with  a 
savage  face.  Two  other  women,  companions  of 
Calumny,  are  busied  with  adorning  their  mistress ; 
these  are  Treachery  and  Fraud.  Behind  them  is 
Eepentance  in  sordid  clothes,  followed  by  Truth, 
modest  and  pure." 

The  fragment  of  this  great  picture  reproduced 
in  our  engraving  represents  the  two  beautiful 


104 


maidens,  Treachery  and  Fraud,  dressing  the  hair  of 
Calumny.  Fraud  binds  her  chignon  with  a  ribbon, 
while  Treachery  places  flowers  in  her  hair.  The 
coiffure  of  Treachery  herself  consists  of  long  float- 
ing locks,  a  head-band  and  veil,  and  a  chignon  of 
braided  hair  partly  enkerchiefed.  But  perhaps  the 
most  beautiful  coiffures  imagined  by  Botticelli  are 
those  of  the  three  Graces  in  the  picture  in  the  acad- 
emy at  Florence,  commonly  known  as  an  "  Alle- 
gory of  Spring."  The  arrangement  of  the  hair 
of  the  central  figure  is  peculiarly  elegant,  con- 
sisting entirely  of  waves  and  torsades,  and  one 
braid  passing  over  the  top  of  the  head,  the  whole 
without  extraneous  ornamentation.  The  figure 
on  the  right  wears  a  more  elaborate  coiffure,  with 
a  braided  chignon,  and  two  long  braids  which 
are  wound  round  the  loose  switches  on  each  side 
and  joined  over  the  bosom,  and  attached  to  a  rich 
brooch  or  pendant,  while  the  front  hair  is  crimped 
and  frizzed,  and  carried  forward  so  as  to  hide  the 
ears  entirely,  and  the  loose  tresses  on  the  crown  en- 
twined with  strings  of  pearls  and  jewelled  pins. 

A  more  richly  ornate  coiffure  is  that  painted  by 
Botticelli  in  the  beautiful  profile  portrait  now  in 
the  Stadel  Kunst-Institut  at  Frankfort,  represent- 
ing that  great  Florentine  lady,  Lucrezia  Tornabuoni, 
wife  of  Piero  dei  Medici,  mother  of  Lorenzo  the 


107 


Magnificent,  and  grandmother  of  Pope  Leo  X. 
The  back  hair  is  gathered  in  a  great  switch,  and 
laced  with  ribbon  as  far  down  as  the  nape,  where 


WAVES   AND   TOHSADES 


it  is  divided  and  plaited  in  two  heavy  braids  orna- 
mented with  pearls,  which  follow  the  contours  of 
the  corsage,  and  are  knotted  on  the  bosom;  an- 
other pearl-embroidered  braid  surrounds  the  head 
vertically,  and  is  coiled  into  a  fantastic  chignon ; 


108 


the  line  of  the  parting  is  marked  by  a  row  of 
pearls,  and  from  it  fall  three  fine  braids  of  different 
lengths  knotted  so  that  the  ends  hang  loose  like 
tassels ;  these  three  pendent  braids  are  laced  to- 
gether with  strings  of  small  pearls,  while  on  the  top 
of  the  head  is  a  splendid  flower-shaped  jewel  and 
an  aigrette  of 'peacocks'  feathers  tilted  backward. 
The  strange  beauty  and  fantastic  richness  of  this 
coiffure  of  hair  and  pearls  —  hair  braided,  hair 
waved,  hair  falling  in  silky  tassels  —  cannot  be  de- 
scribed ;  the  picture  must  be  seen  in  order  that  the 
reader  may  comprehend  the  supreme  taste  of  the 
artist,  and  the  magnificent  simplicity  —  if  we  may 
so  express  it  —  of  the  arrangement  of  the  hair  in 
such  a  manner  that  the  form  of  the  head  is  sedu- 
lously respected,  and  the  purity  of  the  silhouette, 
both  of  the  head  and  of  the  neck,  always  evident 
beneath  the  natural  veil  of  golden  tresses.  This 
respect  of  the  natural  form  of  the  head  is  a  point 
to  which  too  much  attention  cannot  be  paid,  for 
by  this  sign  we  recognize  the  coiffure  of  the  true 
artist,  and  by  this  sign  are  the  inventions  of  the 
great  painters  of  the  Italian  Renaissance  distin- 
guished from  the  monstrous  or  quaintly  voluminous 
coiffures  which  the  vagaries  of  fashion,  uncon- 
trolled by  good  taste,  have  invented  in  unartistic 
epochs  both  before  and  since.  The  beauty  of  the 


FKOM   A    FKESCO   BY   PIEHO   BELLA   FHANCESCA 


Ill 


coiffure  which  aims  purely  at  bringing  into  relief 
the  splendor  of  the  hair,  as  compared  with  that  in 
which  the  head-dress  predominates,  is  admirably  il- 
lustrated by  the  contrast  of  the  two  heads  by  Bot- 
ticelli with  the  heads  in.  the  accompanying  en- 
graving, taken  from  a  fresco  by  Piero  della  Fran- 
cesca,  representing  Italian  ladies  of  the  fifteenth 
century  wearing  the  actual  coiffures  which  the 
fashion  of  the  hour  decreed.  The  fresco  is  a  grand 
work  of  art,  full  of  character  and  mystery,  but  the 
coiffures  are  ephemeral,  and  at  the  best  merely 
curious.  On  the  other  hand,  the  types  of  feminine 
beauty  wrhich  the  artist  has  portrayed  are  so  strik- 
ing, the  features  so  pure,  and  the  necks  so  swanlike, 
that  we  are  inclined  to  believe  that  the  queer  cap 
worn  by  one  lady  is  beautiful  too,  and  to  be  ready 
to  maintain  that  the  escoffion  worn  by  the  other  is 
a  marvel  of  good  taste,  and  the  veil  thrown  over  it 
a  miracle  of  elegance  —  so  true  is  it  that  there  are 
certain  undulating  contours,  a  certain  ovalness  of 
face,  a  certain  fineness  in  the  chiselling  of  lips,  cer- 
tain droopings  of  the  eyelids,  certain  bendings  of 
the  head,  which  ravish  us  beyond  expression,  and 
hold  us  fascinated  for  hours  in  the  contemplation 
of  portraits  of  vanished  beauty. 


VII 
VENICE 

IN  the  picture  by  Bronzino  (1501-70)  reproduced 
in  our  engraving  the  coiffure  is  simple  in  arrange- 
ment, the  hair  being  merely  combed  out,  braided, 
and  gathered  in  a  net.  The  net  itself,  however, 
was  of  extreme  richness,  and  in  harmony  with  the 
magnificent  jewelled  ornamentation  of  the  cor- 
sage, a  net  of  golden  threads  strung  with  pearls. 
Such  a  costume  as  this  lady  wears,  all  cloth -of- 
gold,  brocaded  silk,  damask,  embroidery,  and  pre- 
cious stones,  is  a  monument  of  a  vanished  civiliza- 
tion which  our  modest  modern  luxury  must  ever 
despair  of  repeating;  it  is  the  gown  of  a  lady 
who  lived  in  a  favored  land  where  everything  is 
smiling,  and  where  Nature  herself  preaches  gran- 
deur and  magnificence;  it  is  the  sumptuous  garb 
of  a  princess  whose  life  was  passed  in  one  of 
those  antique  Italian  palaces  which,  gloomy  or 
ruined  as  they  now  are,  still  speak  eloquently  of 
the  resplendent  and  superb  existence  of  the  Sea- 
las,  the  Yiscontis,  the  Strozzis,  the  Gonzagas,  the 


113 


Medicis,  the  mighty  lords  of  Verona,  Mantua, 
and  Florence.  Feminine  costume  in  Italy  in  the 
fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries  harmonized  per- 
fectly with  the  architecture  of  these  palaces,  whose 
colonnades  were  draped  with  the  precious  products 
of  the  looms  of  Venice  and  the  East.  Ample 
and  noble  in  form,  it  was  rich  in  material  and 
gorgeous  in  ornamentation.  Favored  by  nature 
and  fortune,  Italy  was  singularly  favored  by  the 
Muses  before  and  during  the  early  Eenaissance, 
and  her  women  all  possessed  instinctive  good  taste. 
But,  above  all  things,  the  great  artists  and  the  men 
of  letters  exercised  a  sovereign  controlling  influ- 
ence over  fashion,  and  preserved  it  from  those  wild 
caprices  to  which  it  is  exposed  when  the  ladies 
have  no  other  guide  than  the  vulgar  fashion  jour- 
nal. Thus  it  happens  that  while  the  pictures  by 
the  oldest  Flemish  and  French  masters  are,  as  a 
rule,  merely  curious  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
student  of  feminine  elegance,  those  of  the  old  Ital- 
ian masters  are  full  of  suggest! veness.  A  coiffure 
by  Botticelli,  or  a  gown  by  Ghirlandajo,  is  as 
much  a  touchstone  of  eternal  elegance  as  the  head- 
dress of  a  Greek  statue  or  the  drapery  of  a  Tana- 
gra  statuette. 

At  the  same  time  the  Italian  literary  men  de- 
voted much  attention  to  the  study  of  feminine  cos- 


114 

tume  and  of  the  adornment  of  beauty,  and  the 
poets  abound  in  delicate  analyses  and  notations  of 
all  that  is  exquisite  in  the  aspect  and  manners  of 
women.  Firenzuola's  Dialogue  on  the  Beauty  of 
Women  is  a  masterpiece  of  elegant  language  and 
ingenious  observation.  Lodovico  Dolce's  Venetian 

O 

dialogue,  Delia  Institutions  delle  Donne,  is  likewise 
of  extreme  interest ;  and  although  one  cannot  rec- 
ommend the  reading  of  Alessandro  Poccolomini's 
book,  La  ~bella  Creanza  delle  Donne,  from  the 
point  of  view  of  edification,  yet  we  should  be 
sorry  not  to  possess  in  a  discreet  corner  of  our 
library  this  vivacious  little  manual  of  feminine  el- 
egance in  the  sixteenth  century.  As  for  Casti- 
glione's  book  on  the  perfect  lady  and  the  perfect 
gentleman  according  to  the  ideas  of  the  refined 
Court  of  Urbino,  we  have  already  intimated  the 
high  esteem  in  which  we  hold  the  author  of  this 
incomparable  work.  Indeed,  ho\v  could  we  not 
esteem  this  noble  and  cultivated  author,  without 
whose  judgment  and  approbation  Kaphael  and 
Buonarotti  never  thought  ^their  works  perfect  ? 
How  can  the  Count  Baldassar's  name  ever  fade 
from  the  memory  of  fair  women?  No  writer  has 
ever  spoken  more  nobly  of  the  social  role  of  the 
sex,  inasmuch  as  he  has  made  out  woman  to  be 
the  prime  origin  of  all  the  arts  of  civilization  in 


ELEONORA   OF  TOLEDO,  BY  BRONZING 


117 

the  following  passage,  which  we  beg  leave  to  quote 
from  the  Third  Book  of  his  Courtier. 

"  Are  you  not  sensible,"  asks  Castiglione,  "  that 
whatever  exercises  are  agreeable  or  taking  in  the 
world  are  so  only  for  the  sake  of  women  ?  Who 
would  care  to  dance  or  to  learn  all  the  graceful 
motions  of  the  body  but  to  please  them  ?  Who 
has  any  other  end  than  this  in  making  himself 
perfect  in  music  ?  Who  would  ever  write  verses, 
especially  in  a  vulgar  language,  but  to  express  the 
affections  raised  by  women  ?  Consider  what  valu- 
able poems,  both  in  Greek  and  Latin,  would  the 
world  be  deprived  of  if  the  poets  had  no  value  for 
that  sex !  And,  to  omit  all  others,  what  a  loss 
should  we  have  had  if  Francis  Petrarch,  whose 
love-songs  in  our  language  are  so  divinely  fine,  had 
wholly  confined  himself  to  Latin,  as  he  certainly 
would  if  the  love  of  Laura  had  not  been  in  the 
way !" 

It  is  indeed  a  curious  truth  that  if  the  love  of 
Laura  had  not  been  in  the  way,  as  Castiglione 
quaintly  says,  Petrarch  would  have  confined  him- 
self wholly  to  Latin,  and  the  modern  European 
languages  might  have  remained  undeveloped  and 
non-literary.  So  Dante,  in  his  Vita  Nuova,  com- 
menting upon  one  of  his  own  love-sonnets,  says  : 
"  And,  indeed,  it  is  not  a  great  number  of  years 


118 

since  poetry  began  to  be  made  in  the  vulgar 
tongue  ;  the  writing  of  rhymes  in  spoken  language 
corresponding  to  the  writing  in  metre  of  Latin 
verse,  by  a  certain  analogy.  And  I  say  that  it  is 
but  a  little  while,  because  if  we  examine  the  lan- 
guage of  oco  and  the  language  of  si  (i.e.,  the  lan- 
guages of  Provence  and  Tuscany)  we  shall  not  find 
in  those  tongues  any  written  thing  of  an  earlier 
date  than  the  last  hundred  and  fifty  years.  Also 
the  reason  why  certain  of  a  very  mean  sort  ob- 
tained at  the  first  some  fame  as  poets  is,  that  be- 
fore them  no  man  had  written  verses  in  the  lan- 
guage of  si :  and  of  these  the  first  was  moved  to 
the  writing  of  such  verses  by  the  wish  to  make 
himself  understood  of  a  certain  lady  unto  whom 
Latin  poetry  was  difficult." 

And  the  good  poets  who  ventured  to  write  in 
the  vulgar  tongue,  wishing  to  please  their  lady- 
loves, unto  whom  Latin  poetry  was  difficult,  began 
at  once  to  sing  the  charms  of  fair  hair.  Thus 
Fazio  degli  Uberti  (1326-60),  in  a  canzone  so  ex- 
cellent that  it  has  been  attributed  to  Dante,  tracing 
the  portrait  of  his  lady,  Angiola  of  Verona,  says : 

"I  look  at  the  crisp  golden-threaded  hair 

Whereof,  to  thrall  my  heart,  Love  twists  a  net, 
Using  at  times  a  string  of  pearls  for  bait, 
And  sometimes  with  a  single  rose  therein. 


119 


I  look  at  the  amorous  beautiful  mouth, 

The  spacious  forehead  which  her  locks  enclose, 
The  small  white  teeth,  the  straight  and  shapely  nose, 
And  the  clear  brows  of  a  sweet  pencilling. 


"I  look  at  her  white  easy  neck,  so  well 

From  shoulders  and  from  bosom  lifted  out ; 
And  at  her  round  cleft  chin,  which  beyond  doubt 
No  fancy  in  the  world  could  have  designed. 


"I  look  at  the  large  arms,  so  lithe  and  round, 
At  the  hands  which  are  white  and  rosy  too, 
At  the  long  fingers,  clasped  and  woven  through, 
Bright  with  the  ring  which  one  of  them  doth  wear."* 

So  Guido  Cavalcanti,  who  was  Dante's  senior  by 
some  fifteen  years,  in  a  ballad  on  a  shepherd-maid 
whom  he  met  one  day  within  a  copse,  describes  her 

coming 

"with  waving  tresses  pale  and  bright, 
With  rosy  cheer,  and  loving  eyes  of  flame, 
Guiding  the  lambs  beneath  her  wand  aright." 

Cino  da  Pistoia  (1270-1337),  in  his  lament  for 
Selveggia,  cries  : 

"  Ay  me,  alas !  the  beautiful  bright  hair 

That  shed  reflected  gold 
O'er  the  green  growths  on  either  side  the  way." 

*  Translation  of  D.  G.  Rossetti. 


120 


Boccaccio,  in  his  sonnet  on  his  last  sight  of  Fia- 
metta,  describes  how 

"  Round  her  red  garland  and  her  golden  hair 
I  saw  a  fire  about  Fiametta's  head." 

And  in  another  playful  sonnet,  which,  as  the  trans- 
lator, Dante  Gabriel  Rossetti,  has  observed,  recalls 
by  the  beauty  of  its  color  the  painted  pastorals  of 
Giorgione,  Boccaccio  again  dwells  upon  the  fasci- 
nation of  golden  hair.  But  this  sonnet  is  so  dainty 
that  we  must  quote  it  entirely  in  Rossetti's  ren- 


dering : 


OF   THREE   GIRLS    AND   OF   THEIR   TALK 


"  By  a  clear  well,  within  a  little  field 

Full  of  green  grass  and  flowers  of  every  hue, 
Sat  three  young  girls,  relating  (as  I  knew) 
Their  loves.     And  each  had  twined  a  bough  to  shield 
Her  lovely  face  ;  and  the  green  leaves  did  yield 
The  golden  hair  their  shadow  ;  while  the  two 
Sweet  colors  mingled,  both  blown  lightly  through 
With  a  soft  wind  forever  stirr'd  and  still'd. 
After  a  little  while  one  of  them  said 
(I  heard  her)  :    '  Think  !     If  ere  the  next  hour  struck 

Each  of  our  lovers  should  come  here  to-day, 
Think  you  that  we  should  fly  or  feel  afraid  ?' 
To  whom  the  others  answered :  '  From  such  luck 
A  girl  would  be  a  fool  to  run  away.'" 

As  for  Petrarch,  he  will  hear  of  none  but  golden 
locks.  His  Laura  has  black  eyes  and  a  beautiful 
white  face,  and  in  the  second  canzone  he  declares 


VIOLANTE,  BY   PALM  A    VECCIIIO 


123 

that  "  never  was  golden  hair  twisted  into  a  blond 
braid  by  a  lady  so  beautiful  as  she  who  has  de- 
prived me  of  all  freedom  of  will."  Elsewhere  he 
says,  "  The  blond-hair  neighbor  of  the  eyes  that 
lead  my  years  to  so  speedy  an  end,  eclipses  the 
brilliancy  of  gold,  and  of  topazes  on  snow  in  the 
sunshine."  And,  again,  he  speaks  of  "  the  golden 
tresses  that  ought  to  fill  the  sun  with  boundless 
jealousy" ;  and  elsewhere,  "  in  the  golden  hair  of 
Laura,  Love  has  hidden  the  bonds  with  which  he 
grasps  me" ;  and  again :  "  Her  head  was  like  fine 
gold,  her  face  white  as  snow,  her  eyelashes  were 
black  as  ebony,  and  her  eyes  were  two  stars ;  there- 
fore Love  did  not  stretch  his  bow  in  vain.".  .  . 
"  The  suave  breeze  unfolds  and  tosses  the  gold 
that  Love  has  spun  and  woven  with  his  hand ;  by 
the  beautiful  eyes  of  Laura  and  by  her  tresses 
he  enthralls  my  weary  heart.".  .  .  "  The  forehead 
and  the  hair  so  beautiful  that,  to  see  them  in  sum- 
mer at  noonday,  they  surpass  the  sun  in  brill- 
iancy.". .  .  "  The  eyes  of  which  I  have  spoken  so 
warmly,  and  the  arms  and  the  hands  and  the  feet 
arid  the  face  that  ravished  me  and  made  me  some- 
thing distinct  from  all  other  men,  the  crimped  hair 
shining  like  pure  gold,  and  the  flash  of  angelic 
laughter  that  made  for  me  an  earthly  paradise,  are 
now  a  little  dust."  Then,  finally,  when  Laura  ap- 


124 

pears  to  Petrarch  for  the  last  time  in  a  dream,  the 
poet  exclaims,  with  the  obstinacy  of  eternal  ad- 
miration, "  Are  these  the  blond  tresses  and  the 
golden  braids  that  hold  me  still  in  bondage,  and 
are  these  the  eyes  that  were  my  sun  ?" 

Such  being  the  unanimity  of  the  poets  of  the 
day,  golden  hair  became  necessarily  fashionable. 
There  was  no  alternative,  the  more  so  as  the  testi- 
mony of  the  ancients  was  also  found  to  be  in  favor 
of  blond  locks.  From  Homer  to  Apuleius  the  ad- 
miration of  fair  hair  persists.  Aphrodite  was  a 
blonde,  so  was  the  beautiful  Byrrhene  and  the  sou- 
brette  Photis,  whose  charms  Apuleius  has  daintily 
described  in  a  passage  which  everybody  knows, 
but  which,  doubtless,  few  remember.  Blond,  too, 
was  Milton's  Eve,  who 

"as  a  veil  down  to  the  slender  waist 
Her  unadorned  golden  tresses  wore 
Dishevel'd,  but  in  wanton  ringlets  waved 
As  the  vine  curls  her  tendrils." 

Therefore  Firenzuola,  in  his  description  of  the 
beauty  of  the  ideal  woman  of  the  epoch  of  the 
Renaissance  in  Italy,  requires  her  to  have  beauti- 
ful hair,  fine,  soft,  and  blond,  either  the  color  of 
gold  or  of  honey,  or  like  the  bright  rays  of  the 
resplendent  sun.  This  blond  hair  must  be  crisp, 


125 

abundant,  and  long,  as  we  see  it  in  the  coiffures 
of  Botticelli's  figures,  and  especially  in  the  por- 
traits by  the  Venetian  painter  Palma  Yecchio 
(1480-1548),  who  delights  to  depict  his  beautiful 
daughter  Yiolante  with  her  luxuriant  hair  hang- 
ing in  long  and  voluminous  tresses,  adorned  with  a 
simple  fillet  of  ribbon,  or  with  a  string  of  pearls 
and  a  jewel  over  the  forehead.  This  same  fig- 
ure of  Yiolante  appears  constantly  in  the  pictures 
of  Titian,  for  whom  she  frequently  posed,  and 
who,  like  Palma,  delights  in  golden  hair.  Titian, 
however,  generally  paints  a  composed  coiffure,  dis- 
creetly adorned  with  strings  of  pearls  and  a  jewel 
or  two,  rather  than  loose  flowing  tresses.  But 
both  Titian  and  Palma,  and  all  the  Venetians  of 
the  early  Eenaissance,  paint  blond  hair ;  Botti- 
celli's women,  too,  are  all  blondes ;  and  yet  blond 
hair  was  the  exception  in  Italy.  Evidently  the 
Italian  ladies  of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centu- 
ries corrected  nature,  as  the  Cynthias,  the  Lyclias, 
and  the  Lalages  did  in  the  days  of  Ovid,  Martial, 
and  Juvenal.  The  transformation  of  the  natural 
brunette  into  the  artificial  blonde  was  obtained  by 
means  of  dyes  and  bleaching  lotions.  If  the  truth 
were  known,  it  would  perhaps  be  discovered  that 
Petrarch's  Laura  dyed  her  hair  just  as  Poppaea 
dyed  hers  at  the  request  of  Nero,  and  doubtless  by 


126 

the  same  means,  for  in  the  Eoman  writers  we  read 
about  processes  of  bleaching  the  hair  and  drying  it 
in  the  sun  exactly  similar  to  those  mentioned  by 
the  Venetian  authors,  and  illustrated  by  Yecellio 
in  his  book  of  costumes.  The  shades  affected  by 
the  Eoman  ladies  were  also  the  same  as  those  that 
were  fashionable  in  Renaissance  Italy.  There  was 
the  brilliant  blond,  or  rutilus,  the  golden  or  tawny 
blond,  and  the  blond  cendre,  as  the  French  call  it, 
or,  as  Firenzuola's  terms  run,  golden  blond,  honey 
blond,  and  lionato  or  tawny. 

Thus  we  read  in  that  strangely  enigmatical  trea- 
tise of  love  and  architecture  the  Hypnerotomachia^ 
written  in  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth,  century  by 
the  Venetian  monk  Francesco  Colonna,  the  descrip- 
tion which  Folia  gives  of  the  beginning  of  Poliph- 
ilo's  invincible  passion.  "  I  was  sitting,"  she  says, 
"  according  to  the  custom  of  beautiful  young  girls, 
at  the  window,  or  rather  on  the  balcony,  of  my 
palace.  My  blond  hair — my  blond  hair,  the  delight 
of  young  girls  —  was  floating  loosely  over  my 
snowy  shoulders.  Bathed  with  an  ambrosia  des- 
tined to  render  it  as  brilliant  as  threads  of  gold,  it 
was  drying  in  the  rays  of  ardent  Phoebus.  Proud 
to  serve  me,  a  maid  was  combing  my  hair  with  in- 
finite care.  No,  I  dare  to  say  the  hair  of  Androm- 
eda did  not  seem  as  beautiful  to  Perseus,  nor 


PEARLS   AND  JEWELS,  FKOM   A  PICTUKE   BY   TITIAN 


129 


that  of  Photis  to  Lucius.  Suddenly  Poliphilo, 
having  caught  sight  of  me,  could  not  remove  from 
me  his  burning  and  devouring  looks,  and  from 
that  moment  a  ray  of  the  sun  of  love  was  kindled 
within  his  bosom." 

Such  is  the  first  testimony  that  we  have  in  Ital- 
ian literature  of  the  existence  of  that  "  arte  bion- 
deggiante  "  which  became  a  craze  and  a  scandal  in 
the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries,  and  which 
has  survived  even  to  the  present  day.  Thanks  to 
this  art,  of  which  far  be  it  from  us  to  speak  evil, 
the  genius  of  woman  is  enabled  to  create  that  rare 
and  delicious  combination  of  fair  hair  and  dark 
eyes  of  which  unassisted  nature  is  so  niggardly. 
Thanks  to  the  "  arte  biondeggiante,"  the  modern 
world  is  full  of  beauties  like  the  chorus  of  virgins 
that  Joachim  du  Bellay  celebrates  in  his  epithala- 
miuin  of  Marguerite  of  France,  Duchess  of  Savoy : 

"Leurs  tresses  bkmdoyantes 
Voletoient  oudoyantes 

Sur  leur  col  blanchissant ; 
Leurs  yeux  comme  planetes, 
Sur  leurs  faces  brunettes 

Alloient  resplendissant." 


VIII 
THE  SPANISH  TOQUE 

ALMOST  all  those  who  have  written  dainty  trea- 
tises about  the  beauty  and  adornment  of  women 
have  referred  to  the  opinion  of  Apuleius  as  regards 
the  question  of  hair.  It  is  even  allowable  to  imagine 
that  the  austere  Tertullian,  when  he  thundered  so  el- 
oquently against  the  use  of  hair-dye  and  wigs  and 
fantastic  wimples,  had  not  forgotten  the  passage  of 
the  Golden  Ass  in  which  is  related  the  amorous  ad- 
venture of  Lucius  and  Photis.  For  Tertullian,  it 
must  be  remembered,  the  son  of  a  centurion  of  the 
Proconsul  of  Africa,  born  at  Carthage  about  the 
year  A.D.  160,  always  lived  in  his  native  town,  Avhere 
he  practised  law  before  he  became  the  champion  of 
Christianity.  His  boyhood  and  youth  coincided 
with  the  epoch  of  the  oratorical  triumphs  of  Apu- 
leius. Many  a  time  he  must  have  been  among  the 
enthusiastic  listeners  who  applauded  the  lectures 
and  readings  of  the  great  rhetorician  in  the  theatre 
of  Carthage,  and  who  marvelled  at  his  novel  prose, 
so  rich  in  color,  so  impressionistic,  so  crisp  and  pictur- 


131 


esque,  so  widely  different  from  the  classical  prose  of 
Koine.  At  any  rate,  the  prose  of  Apuleius  is  the 
model  which  Tertullian  followed  in  his  own  literary 
efforts.  This  mode  of  expression  thus  came  to  pre- 
vail in  the  church  of  Carthage ;  and  through  the 
church  of  Carthage,  which  played  a  preponderating 
role  in  the  history  of  Western  Christianity,  the  pict- 
uresque style  was  transmitted  to  Spain  and  the 
other  European  communities,  and  so  presided  over 
the  birth  of  modern  literature.  Thus  the  true  liter- 
ary ancestor  of  the  Latin  Church  may  be  said  to  be 
Apuleius,  the  author  of  that  more  than  piquant 
Golden  Ass,  in  which  we  read  the  following  pane- 
gyric of  hair : 

"If  you  cut  off  the  hair  of  the  most  beautiful 
of  women  and  deprive  her  face  of  its  natural  orna- 
ment, nay,  were  she  of  heavenly  descent,  engen- 
dered of  the  sea,  nurtured  in  the  midst  of  the  waves, 
in  a  word,  Yenus  herself,  accompanied  by  the  Loves 
and  Graces,  adorned  with  her  girdle  and  perfumed 
with  the  sweetest  odors,  if  her  head  w^ere  bald  she 
could  not  please  even  her  own  Yulcan. 

"  What  is  there  more  charming  than  hair  of  a 
beautiful  color,  neatly  arranged,  shining  softly  or 
brilliantly  in  the  sun  ?  Some  hair  is  of  blond  more 
resplendent  than  the  sun,  but  darker  towards  the 
roots.  Other  hair,  black  as  the  plumage  of  a  crow, 


132 

plays  changefully  in  the  light  like  the  breast  of  a 
pigeon,  and,  perfumed  with  the  essences  of  Araby, 
combed  out  and  braided  behind,  resembles  a  mirror 
which  embellishes  and  reflects  in  the  eye  of  the 
lover  the  image  of  her  whom  he  adores.  Is  it  not 
charming,  again,  to  see  a  great  quantity  of  hair, 
artistically  arranged  on  the  top  of  the  head,  or  else, 
when  the  hair  is  of  exceptional  length,  loose  and 
floating  over  the  shoulders  ?  In  short,  there  is 
something  so  distinguished  in  beautiful  hair  that 
even  though  a  woman  should  appear  with  all  sorts 
of  ornaments  and  robes  covered  with  gold  and  pre- 
cious stones,  her  efforts  are  in  vain  unless  she  have 
withal  fine  hair." 

Blacker  and -more  brilliant  than  jet  must  be  the 
hair  of  the  Persian  beauty ;  and  as  for  the  length, 
we  must  hear  Firdousi  describe  the  charms  of  the  he- 
roic Koudabah,  daughter  of  Mehrab,  King  of  Cabul, 
whose  black  tresses  were  so  abundant  and  so  long 
that  one  day  from  the  top  of  a  tower  of  the  royal 
castle  where  she  was  taking  the  air,  having  per- 
ceived Zal  riding  back  from  the  chase,  she  let  them 
fall  slowly  to  the  foot  of  the  tower  in  order  to  help 
him  to  climb  the  wall,  for  her  heart  had  suddenly 
leaped  within  her  bosom  at  the  sight  of  the  un- 
known lord,  and  Zal  used  the  solid  coils  of  these 
strong  and  magnificent  ringlets  like  the  rungs  of  a 


MARGUERITE   OF  PARMA,  BY   COELLO 


135 

ladder  to  climb  up  and  approach  the  intrepid  re- 
cluse. 

In  the  annals  of  Moorish  Spain  we  might  dis- 
cover romantic  stories  that  would  be  a  match  for 
this  one.  In  the  art  of  Spain,  however,  we  do  not 
find  much  that  is  suggestive  in  the  way  of  coiffure. 
Certainly  the  blue-black  tresses  of  the  Madonnas  of 
Murillo  are  beautiful;  admirable,  too,  are  the  combs 
and_patillas  and  the  mantos  of  the  coiffure^oFtEe 
various  provinces  of  Spain,  but  their  interest  is 
local,  for  none  but  Spanish  women  can  wear  them. 
As  for  the  court  coiffures,  the  court  costumes,  and 
the  court  ladies  immediately  after  the  grand  epoch 
of  Philip  IY.  and  of  Velasquez,  we  have  only  to 
read  Madame  d'Aulnoy's  Memoires  de  la  Cour  $Es- 
pagne  in  order  to  confirm  us  in  the  unfavorable 
opinion  which  the  portraits  of  the  time  have  given 
us.  Of  the  court  ladies,  Madame  d'Aulnoy  says : 
"  They  are  almost  all  short,  and  extremely  thin  and 
slender;  their  skin  is  soft,  black,  and  painted;  their 
features  regular,  their  eyes  full  of  fire,  their  hair 
black  and  abundant,  their  hands  pretty,  and  their 
feet  of  surprising  smallness.  Their  dress  becomes 
them  so  ill  that  unless  one  is  accustomed  to  it  one 
finds  it  unendurable."  And  elsewhere  the  same 
observer,  speaking  of  the  queen,  Louise  d' Orleans, 
niece  of  Louis  XIV.,  who  married  Charles  II.,  son 


136 

of  Philip  IV.,  writes :  "  The  queen  could  not  help 
smiling  when  she  saw  herself  for  the  first  time 
dressed  in  the  Spanish  fashion,  for,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  her  alone,  I  never  saw  any  foreigner  who 
looked  well  in  this  costume.  After  passing  through 
several  rooms  which  are  truly  admirable,  I  found 
her  in  a  cabinet,  painted  and  gilded  and  filled  with 
large  looking-glasses  fixed  in  the  wood-work  of  the 
walls.  She  was  seated  on  an  ottoman  near  the 
window,  and  making  some  embroidery  of  gold  lace 
and  blue  silk.  Her  hair  was  parted  in  the  middle, 
and  arranged  in  a  braid  laced  with  big  pearls  and 
attached  to  her  girdle ;  she  wore  aT~~rose  velvet 
gown  embroidered  with  silver,  and  ear-rings  that 
hung  down  over  her  bosom,  and  so  heavy  that  she 
took  one  of  them  off  so  that  I  might  feel  the  weight, 
which  astonished  me." 

The  court  coiffures  during  the  preceding  reign  of 
Philip  IV.  may  be  seen  in  the  pictures  of  Velasquez, 
in  the  faded  blond  hair  of  the  infantas,  parted  on 
one  side,  and  looped  in  a  bang  over  the  forehead, 
or  parted  in  the  middle,  prodigiously  frizzled,  and 
tied  at  the  ends  with  ribbons  and  jewels  in  a  man- 
ner that  refined  taste  can  scarcely  approve. 

The  finest  examples  of  costume  and  coiffure  that 
Spanish  art  affords  are  to  be  found  in  the  portraits 
by  the  Portuguese  artist  Alonso  Coello  (1505  -  90), 


137 

a  pupil  of  Kaphael  and  of  Antonio  Moro,  and  court 
painter  to  Philip  II.  of  Spain.  Our  illustrations  re- 
produce two  exquisite  works  by  Coello.  One  is  the 
portrait  of  Marguerite  of  Parma,  and  the  other  is 
the  portrait  of  Maria  of  Austria,  daughters  of 
Charles  V.,  Emperor  of  Germany  and  King  of  Spain, 
the  first  of  the  name.  Both  these  pictures  are  in 
the  Brussels  Museiyn.  Thus,  after  all,  the  models 
in  question  were  not  Spaniards,  but  Austrians,  and 
the  painter  was  not  a  Spaniard,  but  a  Portuguese ; 
nor  is  there  anything  particularly  Spanish  about 
either  of  the  portraits  except  the  head-dress  worn 
by  Marguerite  of  Parma,  which  is  generally  known 
as  a  Spanish  toque  —  a  fashion  which  afterwards 
gained  great  favor  at  the  court  of  France,  and 
remains  an  example  always  worthy  of  imitation. 
The  wavy  hair  is  brushed  back  from  the  fore- 
head and  up  from  the  neck,  and  gathered  some- 
what loosely  in  a  high  chignon  surmounted  by  a 
velvet  toque,  with  a  bouquet  of  feathers  on  the  left, 
the  toque  being  richly  ornamented  with  jewelry  in 
the  form  of  mounted  pearls  and  chains  laced  diag- 
onally. The  hair,  too,  is  adorned  with  pearls  and 
jewels,  among  which  is  a  serpent  of  enamelled  gold. 
Around  her  neck,  below  the  not  yet  too  volumi- 
nous ruffle,  the  princess  wears  a  magnificent  collar 
of  mounted  jewels,  and  the  general  aspect  of  the 


138 

lady  and  of  her  attire  is  noble,  sumptuous,  and  in 
good  taste,  consideration,  of  course,  being  made  of 
the  conditions  in  which  she  lived.  Evidently  so 
rich  a  costume  and  so  resplendent  a  coiffure  as  this 
could  scarcely  be  worn  by  young  ladies  who  play 
lawn-tennis,  ride  on  the  top  of  mail-coaches,  chat- 
ter like  magpies,  and  are  generally  unquiet  in  their 
movements  and  gestures.  A  dignified  costume  re- 
quires a  dignified  wearer.  However,  it  must  be 
stated  that  the  costume  reproduced  in  our  engrav- 
ing is  one  that  was  worn  by  Marguerite  of  Parma 
for  riding  on  horseback,  and  Brantome  tells  us  that 
the  black  velvet  Spanish  toque,  either  simple  or 
trimmed  with  feathers  and  jewels,  was  the  coiffure 
considered  by  his  fair  contemporaries  to  be  most 
becoming  for  riding  as  well  as  for  evening  dress. 
For  wearing  a  Spanish  toque  the  hair  may  be  sim- 
ply curled  in  front,  and  held  behind  in  a  net  or 
crepine  of  silk  or  gold  thread.  The  form  of  the 
toque  may  also  be  varied  by  the  greater  or  less 
elevation  of  the  crown,  and  by  the  addition  of  a 
brim,  either  circular  or  of  irregular  shape,  and 
adorned  with  a  jewelled  band  and  an  aigrette,  such 
as  we  see  in  the  portraits  of  Marie  Stuart  when  she 
first  appeared  at  the  court  of  France  in  all  the  brill- 
iancy of  her  youth  and  beauty.  The  coquette,  too, 
will  put  new  expression  into  the  Spanish  toque  by 


MARIA   OF   AUSTRIA,  BY   COELLO 


141 


wearing  it  a  little  on  one  side,  thus  adding  piquan- 
cy to  grace. 

A  more  elaborate  and  curious  coiffure  is  that 
worn  by  Maria  of  Austria  in  the  engraved  portrait 
given.  The  hair,  parted  in  the  middle,  is  brushed 
off  the  forehead,  braided  and  coiled  in  a  chignon  f 
behind,  while  on  the  top  of  the  head  is  a  little! 
frizzed  toupet,  and  on  the  left  side  a  bunch  of 
small  curls  and  a  tassel  of  crimped  hair,  the  curls 
arranged  star -wise,  withji  jewel  and  pendant  in 
the  centre ;  a  diadem  of  gold  set  with  precious 
stones  has  a  large  jewel  and  pendant  in  the  mid- . 
die,  falling  just  over  the  parting ;  and  the  coiffure 
is  completed  by  a  fine  white  gauze  veil  or  scarf 
edged  with  lace,  to  each  point  of  which  is  attached 
a  spangle.  This  scarf  is  tied  in  the  middle  of  the 
corsage  to  a  ring  from  which  hangs  a  jewelled 
cross  with  three  pear  -  shaped  pearls  suspended 
from  it.  Round  the  waist  is  a  heavy  jewelled 
girdle,  and  the  skirt  is  fastened  down  the  front 
by  means  of  jewelled  clasps,  while  the  upper  hem 
of  the  corsage  is  trimmed  with  a  band  of  jewels. 
The  high  collar  is  enriched  with  spangles,  and 
terminates  in  a  dainty  frill  closely  enframing  the 
face,  and  the  tags  that  adorn  the  ample  velvet 
sleeves  are  beautifully  wrought  with  gold  and 
crystal.  Notice  also  the  slashed  gloves  with  the 


142 

finger-rings  showing  through  the  creves,  the  taper 
fingers  of  the  white  ungloved  hand,  the  ear-drop- 
pers fixed  in  the  doubly  pierced  ears  by  double 
rings.  Truly  this  is  a  most  noble  lady  and  a 
most  brave  costume. 

In  these  two  portraits  of  the  daughters  of 
Charles  Y.  we  see  excellent  specimens  of  the  taste 
of  the  sixteenth  century  in  jewelry.  The  fashion 
of  the  day,  more  especially  in  France  and  in  the 
"Low  Countries,  was  to  adorn  the  hair  with  a  pro- 
fusion of  enseignes,  agrafes,  and  fiallaux,  as  the  old 
French  terms  are,  the  latter  meaning  balls  of  gold 
or  silver  adorned  with  precious  stones  and  mount- 
ed on  pins,  which  were  stuck  in  the  hair.  Agrafes 
are  merely  buckles  or  clasps  like  the  serpent  worn 
by  Marguerite  of  Parma.  Enseignes  are  those 
big  jewels  such  as  we  see  fixed  in  the  hair  of 
both  these  ladies,  and  such  as  we  find  described 
in  great  numbers  in  the  inventory  of  Gabrielle 
d'Estrees,  composed  of  diamonds,  rubies,  sap- 
phires, and  pendent  pearls,  set  in  elaborate  gold 
mounts  enriched  with  colored  enamels — jewels  of 
remarkable  design  due  to  the  happy  alliance  of 
Flemish  skill  and  Italian  taste,  and  designed  by  the 
great  artists  of  the  Renaissance,  Benvenuto  Cellini, 
Androuet  du  Cerceau,  Theodore  de  Bry,  and  Pierre 
Woeriot — the  latter  a  famous  designer  of  rings. 


IX 

THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY 

"  WHEN  one  writes  about  women,"  said  Diderot, 
"one  should  dip  the  pen  in  the  rainbow  and  dry 
the  lines  with  the  dust  of  butterflies'  wings.  It 
suffices  not  to  talk  about  women,  and  to  talk  well, 
Monsieur  Thomas ;  you  must  make  me  see  them. 
Place  them  before  my  eyes  like  so  many  ther- 
mometers of  the  smallest  vicissitudes  of  manners 
and  usages." 

If  we  were  to  follow  Diderot's  advice  in  speak- 
ing of  the  coiffures  that  were  successively  d  la 
mode  in  Europe  during  the  seventeenth  and  eigh- 
teenth centuries,  and  if  we  were  to  avail  ourselves 
even  sparingly  of  the  documents  afforded  by  the 
painting  and  the  sculpture  of  that  epoch,  we 
should  have  to  write  a  large  volume  instead 
of  a  short  chapter,  for  the  arrangement  of  hair 
was  never  more  capricious  than  it  was  in  the 
reigns  of  Louis  XIV.,  Louis  XV.,  and  Louis  XVI., 
when  France  became  definitively  the  Queen  of 
Fashion  for  the  whole  modern  world.  Therefore 


144 

Mr.  Addison,  in  the  ninety-eighth  Spectator  (June 
22,  1711),  maintained  that  a  lady's  head-dress  is 
the  most  variable  thing  in  all  nature.  "Within 
my  own  memory,"  he  wrote,  "  I  have  seen  it  rise 
and  fall  above  thirty  degrees.  About  ten  years 
ago  it  shot  up  to  a  very  great  height,  insomuch 
that  the  female  part  of  our  species  were  much 
taller  than  the  men.  The  women  were  of  such 
enormous  stature  that  we  appeared  as  grasshop- 
pers before  them.  For  my  own  part,  as  I  do  not 
love  to  be  insulted  by  women  who  are  taller  than 
myself,  I  admire  the  sex  much  more  in  their  pres- 
ent humiliation,  which  has  reduced  them  to  their 
natural  dimensions,  than  when  they  had  extended 
their  persons  and  lengthened  themselves  out  into 
formidable  and  gigantic  figures.  I  am  not  for 
adding  to  the  beautiful  edifices  of  Nature,  nor 
for  raising  any  whimsical  superstructure  upon  her 
plans.  I  must  therefore  repeat  it,  that  I  am  high- 
ly pleased  with  the  coiffure  now  in  fashion,  and 
think  it  shews  the  good  sense  which  at  present 
very  much  reigns  among  the  valuable  part  of  the 
sex." 

Further  on  in  the  same  essay  Mr.  Spectator  gives 
the  following  excellent  advice  about  dressing  hair : 
"  I  would  desire  the  fair  sex  to  consider  how  im- 
possible it  is  for  them  to  add  anything  that  can  be 


145 

ornamental  to  what  is  already  the  masterpiece  of 
Nature.  The  head  has  the  most  beautiful  appear- 
ance, as  well  as  the  highest  station  in  a  human 
figure.  Nature  has  laid  out  all  her  art  in  beautify- 
ing the  face ;  she  has  touched  it  with  vermilion, 
planted  in  it  a  double  row  of  ivory,  made  it  the 
seat  of  smiles  and  blushes,  lighted  it  up  and  en- 
livened it  with  the  brightness  of  the  eyes,  hung  it 
on  each  side  with  curious  organs  of  sense,  given  it 
airs  and  graces  that  cannot  be  described,  and  sur- 
rounded it  with  such  a  flowing  shade  of  hair  as 
sets  all  its  beauties  in  the  most  agreeable  light.  In 
short,  she  seems  to  have  designed  the  head  as  the 
cupola  to  the  most  glorious  of  her  works ;  and 
when  we  load  it  with  such  a  pile  of  supernumerary 
ornaments  we  destroy  the  symmetry  of  the  human 
figure,  and  foolishly  contrive  to  call  off  the  eye 
from  great  and  real  beauties  to  childish  gewgaws, 
ribbands,  and  bone-lace." 

While  not  entirely  agreeing  with  Mr.  Addison  in 
his  sweeping  condemnation  of  gewgaws  and  rib- 
bons, we  think  that  the  most  tasteful  and  refined 
coiffures  are  those  in  which  the  predominant  ele- 
ment is  the  natural  hair  and  not  the  gewgaw.  The 
basis  of  fashion  in  coiffure  is  the  hair,  and  in  dress 
it  is  the  garment ;  and  as  the  component  parts  of 
dress  are  continually  changing  from  great  to  little, 


146 


from  long  to  short,  from  tight  to  loose,  and  vice 
versa,  so  the  coiffure  of  women  has  continually 
varied  from  close  to  floating,  from  flat  to  fluffy, 
from  compact  to  voluminous,  from  absence  of  orna- 
ment to  excess  of  ornament.  At  one  time  the 
head-dress  grows  in  height,  and  when  the  maximum 
of  vertically  has  been  obtained,  the  direction  of 
obliquity  is  gradually  substituted  for  it,  as  in  the 
hennins,  or  steeple  coiffures ;  and  then  horizontality 
takes  the  place  both  of  vertically  and  of  obliquity, 
and  in  the  escqffion  the  coiffure  grows  out  laterally 
in  the  form  of  enormous  cushions.  All  these 
growths  of  coiffure,  being  more  or  less  architect- 
ural and  requiring  important  frame-works  and  ac- 
cessories, invite  ornament,  and  the  natural  tendency 
of  ornament  being  to  creep,  encroach,  and  monopo- 
lize, the  hair  little  by  little  disappears,  and  the  gew- 
gaws and  ribbons  remain  triumphant.  Then  comes 
the  inevitable  reaction,  and  under  some  sociolog- 
ical or  private  influence  the  gewgaw  is  banished, 
the  natural  hair  restored  to  favor,  and  the  whole 
process  from  simplicity  to  complexity  begins  over 
again. 

Since  the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages  the  coiffure  of 
modern  Europe  has  been  influenced  by  three  series 
of  phenomena,  among  which  must  be  mentioned 
first  of  all  the  artistic  movement  of  the  Renais- 


DIANE   BK   POITIEUS,   15V   JEAN    GOUJON 

sance,  which  called  attention  to  the  models  of  clas- 
sical antiquity  and  created  new  models  of  its  own, 
such  as  we  find  in  the  portraits  of  the  great  Italian 
artists,  and  in  the  work  of  the  French  artists  of  the 


148 


sixteenth  century,  like  Jean  Goujon  (1515-72),  Jean 
Cousin  (1501-90),  Germain  Pilon  (1515-90),  and 
Barthelemy  Prieur  (died  1611),  who  adapted  the  se- 
vere and  dignified  style  of  antique  form  and  orna- 
ment to  the  requirements  of  the  voluptuous  court  of 
Henry  II.,  sacrificing  somewhat  of  nobleness,  it  is 
true,  but  superadding  a  grace  and  elegance  that  are 
purely  French.  Examples  of  the  ideal  of  feminine 
beauty  thus  obtained  may  be  found  in  the  museum 
of  the  Louvre  in  the  admirable  figures  by  Germain 
Pilon  forming  a  group  of  three  destined  to  sup- 
port the  shrine  of  Ste.-Genevieve,  and  in  Jean 
Goujon's  famous  figure  of  Poitiers  represented  as 
the  Huntress  Diana,  with  a  coiffure  of  admirable 
complexity  and  gracefulness  of  form.  These  coif- 
fures, like  the  finest  which  Italian,  Roman,  and 
Hellenic  art  afford  in  the  epochs  of  most  refined 
culture,  owe  their  beauty  to  the  arrangement  of 
the  hair,  and  to  the  general  silhouette  rather  than 
to  the  ornamentation.  We  might  even  go  so  far 
as  to  say  that  these  coiffures  are  well  and  firmly 
drawn,  remembering  that  the  art  of  dressing  hair 
is  really  a  humble  branch  of  sculpture,  and  that,  as 
Sir  Joshua  Keynolds  says  in  his  Discourses,  though 
it  is  difficult  to  define  what  grace  is,  we  feel  that 
its  natural  foundation  is  correctness  of  design.  The 
moment  that  the  beauty  of  classical  antiquity  was 


149 


revealed,  whether  at  Eome,  Florence,  Fontaine- 
bleau,  or  Nuremberg,  the  moment  the  art  of  the 
Eenaissance  became  triumphant,  the  fantastic  coif- 
fures of  the  Middle  Ages,  conceived  without  regard 
to  the  form  of  the  head  and  without  respect  to 
the  proportions  of  the  human  body  and  its  various 
parts,  were  inevitably  condemned,  and  the  only 
traces  of  them  to  be  found  nowadays  are  in  remote 
survivals  observable  in  the  costumes  of  religious 
orders,  and  in  the  quaint  caps  and  head-dresses 
that  are  worn  by  the  country  people  in  France, 
Germany,  Holland,  and  Hungary. 

The  second  series  of  phenomena  is  connected 
with  the  Reformation  and  the  concomitant  move- 
ment in  favor  of  asceticism,  which  naturally  caused 
women  to  do  away  with  gewgaws  and  ribbons, 
and  to  dress  their  hair  with  all  simplicity.  Natu- 
rally, from  the  point  of  view  of  artistic  beauty, 
little  good  can  be  expected  of  asceticism,  while 
Protestantism  is  obviously  a  cold  and  unprofitable 
nursery-ground  for  feminine  elegance.  Neverthe- 
less, there  is  one  kind  of  coiffure  not  without 
charm  which,  we  might  almost  say,  is  peculiarly 
characteristic  of  Protestant  countries,  inasmuch  as 
it  prevailed  for  two  and  a  half  centuries  in  the 
Netherlands  and  in  England,  and  has  not  yet  en- 
tirely disappeared  in  the  latter  country.  This  is 


150 

the  coiffure  of  Mile.  La  Valliere,  the  hair  parted  in 
the  middle  and  brushed  flat  on  the  top  of  the 
head,  with  bunches  of  ringlets  on  each  side  and  a 
chignon  behind.  The  quantity  of  the  side  ringlets 
varies,  and  also  their  length  ;  sometimes  we  find  a 
large  bouquet  of  ringlets,  and  at  other  times  only 
two  or  three  long  ringlets,  very  precisely  curled. 
Furthermore,  as  coquetry  is  stronger  even  than 
Protestantism,  a  small  quantity  of  ornament  was 
gradually  added  in  the  shape  of  long  ear -drop- 
pers, and  a  slender  diadem  with  light  pendants  at- 
tached on  each  side,  as  we  see  in  the  accompany- 
ing engraving  representing  a  group  of  Dutch 
ladies  walking,  from  a  picture  by  David  Teniers 
(1610-85). 

The  third  series  of  phenomena  begins  with  the 
glorious  reign  of  Louis  XIV.,  and  the  supremacy 
and  universal  initiative  which  France  henceforward 
assumed  in  European  civilization.  When  Louis 
XIV.  came  to  the  throne  the  table  was  clear.  The 
universe  was  once  more  mere  malleable  clay  which 
the  future  Grand  Monarque  was  destined  to  model 
after  his  own  magnificent  ideas.  His  radiant  Maj- 
esty was  passionately  in  love  with  the  niece  of 
his  minister,  Cardinal  Mazarin,  the  beautiful  Ma- 
rie Mancini,  cette  creature  splendidement  charpentee, 
as  Saint -Evremond  calls  her,  whose  portrait  by 


DUTCH  LADIES  WALKING,   FROM    A   PAINTING  BY   DAVID   TENIEKS 


153 


Pierre  Mignard  (1610-95)  now  hangs  in  the  Ber- 
lin Museum,  resplendent  with  youth  and  vivacity, 
her  rich  wavy  hair  massed  around  her  face  en- 
tirely without  ornament.  From  this  simple  coif- 
fure en  cheveux  were  developed  in  a  few  scores  of 
years  all  the  monstrous  arrangements  which  pro- 
voked the  sagacious  criticism  of  Mr.  Addison,  and 
which  we  shall  carefully  abstain  from  mentioning, 
inasmuch  as  our  design  is  neither  to  write  a  his- 
tory of  coiffure  nor  to  classify  its  archaeology,  but 
merely  to  call  attention  to  certain  examples  which 
seem  to  us  to  retain  permanent  suggestiveness  and 
durable  charm — examples  which  we  shall  find  in 
the  reigns  of  Louis  XV.  and  Louis  XYI.  rather 
than  in  that  of  "  Le  Eoi  Soleil." 

We  cannot  speak  of  the  material  beauty  of  the 
Frenchwoman  of  the  eighteenth  century  without 
mentioning  the  exhaustive  and  masterly  studies  of 
Edmond  and  Jules  de  Goncourt,  La  Femme  au 
X  Vlllieme  Siedc,  and  Z'  Art  duX  Vlllieme  Siecle. 
All  who  wish  to  comprehend  the  modifications  of 
French  physiognomy  in  the  interval  between  Le 
Brun  and  Latour  must  consult  the  great  mass  of 
literary,  historical,  and  artistic  documents  which 
these  authors  have  so  admirably  co-ordinated.  In 
their  volumes  may  be  seen  the  transition  from  the 
pagan  serenity  and  superb  repose  of  the  princesses 


154 


of  the  reign  of  Louis  XIY.  in  their  mythological 
surroundings  to  the  most  piquant,  delicate,  and  ex- 
pressive beauties  of  the  Regency  and  the  reign  of 
Louis  XY.  The  women  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XIY. 
are  bovine,  Junonian,  fleshly,  and  material.  The 
women  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XY.  are  refined,  ani- 
mated, slender;  their  faces  are  illumined  with  in- 
telligence ;  their  mouths  are  mobile  with  irony ; 
their  eyes  shine  with  the  fever  of  pleasure  ;  their 
physiognomy  seems  to  be  impressed  with  all  the 
qualities  of  the  comedies  of  Marivaux,  the  grace, 
the  taste,  the  coquetry,  and  withal  the  tender  and 
loving  heart  of  Sylvia  and  Araminthe.  These  la- 
dies rouged  their  cheeks,  but  they  required  a  rouge 
" qui  dise  quelque  chose"  The  rouge  worn  by  a 
lady  of  quality  was  different  from  that  worn  by  the 
court  lady,  by  the  lourgeoise,  or  by  the  actress;  it 
was  a  mere  tinge,  a  simple  soupgon,  an  impercep- 
tible touch.  As  some  cruel  wit  put  it : 

4 '  Cette  artificieuse  rougeur 
Qui  supplee  au  defaut  de  celle 
Que  jadis  causait  la  pudeur." 

Then,  besides  the  nuance  of  rouge,  the  toilet  of 
the  face  needed  to  be  completed  by  patches,  by 
those  little  pieces  of  black  sticking-plaster  which 
the  poets  called  " des  mouches  dans  le  lait" — those 


MARIE   MANCINI,   BY   PIEKRE   MIGNAHD 


157 

mouchea  that  were  cut  in  the  forms  of  hearts,  cres- 
cents, moons,  stars,  and  comets,  and  hung  out  as 
love-baits,  each  with  its  special  name  —  V assassine 
at  the  corner  of  the  eye,  la  majesteuse  on  the  fore- 
head, Venjouee  in  the  laughing  dimple,  la  galante  in 
the  middle  of  the  cheek,  and  lafriponne  near  the 
lips.  Finally  must  be  mentioned  the  fashion  of 
powdered  hair,  which,  undesirable  as  it  is,  never- 
theless lends  a  particular  piquancy  to  sparkling 
eyes  and  youthful  faces. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  fash- 
ion changes  entirely,  and  the  kind  of  grace  desired 
is  no  longer  piquant,  but  touching  and  sentimental, 
and  the  women  proceed  to  compose  their  faces  ac- 
cording to  the  new  ideal  painted  by  Greuze  and  de- 
scribed by  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau.  The  favorite 
type  is  characterized  by  ingenuousness,  candor,  lan- 
guishing tenderness ;  it  is  at  once  virginal  and  rus- 
tic, and  its  garments  are  veils  _of  whiteness  and 
gauzes  of  simplicity. 

Meanwhile  the  coiffeur,  the  Parisian  dress-maker, 
the  "  Poupee  de  la  Eue  Saint-Honore,"  and  finally 
the  fashion  journal,  came  into  glorious  existence, 
and  all  Europe  was  guided  by  the  modes  of  Paris, 
and  tributary  to  the  art,  the  commerce,  and  the  in- 
dustry of  the  French  capital — thanks,  as  La  Galerie 
des  Modes  says,  not  to  mere  caprice,  "  but  to  the  in- 


158 


ventive  genius  of  the  French  ladies  in  all  that  con- 
cerns dress,  and,  above  all,  to  the  fine  and  delicate 
taste  which  characterizes  the  smallest  trifles  made 
by  their  hands."  The  "  Poupee  de  la  Rue  Saint- 
Honore"  was  the  predecessor  of  the  modern  fash- 
ion journal,  being  a  life-size  doll  which  was  dressed, 
undressed,  and  redressed  in  the  latest  taste  of  Ver- 
sailles or  the  Palais  Royal,  while  replicas  were  sent 
to  England,  Germany,  Italy,  and  Spain,  until  the 
day  when  towards  the  middle  of  the  century  some 
ingenious  persons  conceived  the  idea  of  illustrated 
fashion  journals,  and  announced  in  their  prospec- 
tuses that  henceforward,  through  their  efforts,  for- 
eigners would  no  longer  be  obliged  to  trust  to  dolls, 
"  which  are  always  imperfect,  and  very  dear,  while 
at  the  best  they  can  give  but  a  vague  idea  of  our 
fashions." 

It  is  not  our  purpose  to  speak  of  the  prodigious 
mobility  of  French  fashions  in  dress  during  the 
eighteenth  century ;  let  it  suffice  to  say  that  the 
changes  followed  very  closely  the  various  senti- 
mental transformations  of  the  physiognomy  of 
the  woman  of  the  day,  accompanied  her  beauty, 
suited  themselves  to  her  tastes,  and  composed  for 
her  charms  an  appropriate  frame  or  setting  of 
stuffs,  colors,  and  forms.  Nowadays  these  varia- 
tions which  were  successively  proclaimed  indispen- 


STUDY   OF   A    HEAD,  BY   WATTEAU 


161 


sable  by  the  decrees  of  the  fashion  of  the  day  have 
become  indifferent  to  us ;  the  inevitable  process  of 
elimination  has  thrown  aside  all  that  was  merely 
ephemeral  and  without  style ;  and  thus,  at  the 
present  day,  when  we  examine  the  paintings  and 
engravings  of  the  eighteenth  century,  previous  to 
the  Revolution,  we  remark  in  a  general  way  three 
leading  types— that  invented  by  the  painter  Wat- 
tcau,  the  Louis  XV.  type  with  paniers  and  a  low 
coiffure,  and  the  Louis  XYI.  type  with  the  high 
coiffure  familiar  to  us  through  the  portraits  of 
Marie  Antoinette.  Of.  these  types  the  noblest  is 
that  which  Watteau  invented  by  means  of  his- 
own  exquisite  genius,  and  of  certain  elements 
borrowed  from  the  Venetians  and  the  personages 
of  the  Italian  Comedy  —  the  ample  robe  starting 
from  the  neck,  plaited  in  the  back  like  an  abbe's 
cloak,  and  floating  loosely  down  to  the  feet,  the 
arms  emerging  flo warlike  from  short  sleeves  filled 
with  engageantes  of  lace.  With  this  robe  "Wat- 
teau imagined  a  coiffure  which,  after  the  example 
of  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  he  studied  in  scores  of 
sketches  in  sanguine  that  form  the  delight  of  del- 
icate eyes.  No  painter  has  drawn  more  amorously 
than  Watteau  the  voluptuous  contours  of  hair 
brushed  up  from  the  nape  of  the  neck  and  back 
from  -the  brow,  and  coiled  in  the  form  of  a  per- 


162 

fumed  helmet  on  the  crown,  or  twisted  into 
a  simple  chignon  tied  round  with  a  fillet.  No 
painter  has  rendered  more  delicately  than  Wat- 
teau  the  charm  of  the  movements  of  a  woman's 
head  and  neck ;  the  fascination  of  blond  flesh, 
white  and  silky  like  the  petal  of  a  camellia,  the 
delight  of  flavescent  hair,  ruddy  like  the  golden 
tints  of  sunset,  and  forming  a  luminous  nimbus 
around  the  head ;  the  transition  from  the  warm 
tones  of  the  hair  to  the  mat  sheenless  white  of  the 
neck  formed  by  the  short  downy  hair,  the  cheveux 
follets  that  curl  over  the  nape,  and  seem  span- 
gled by  the  light;  the  rare  beauty  of  the  short 
soft  hair  that  curls  naturally  behind  the  ears.  The 
type  of  feminine  beauty,  seen  and  materialized  by 
Watteau,  is  one  of  the  truly  great  and  precious  in- 
ventions of  art,  as  great,  as  original,  as  fascinating 
as  the  types  of  beauty  which  we  owe  to  Botticelli, 
Leonardo,  Luini,  and  Raphael. 

Beside  Watteau's  figures  all  the  other  feminine 
types  of  the  eighteenth  century  appear  dull  and 
pretentious,  though  some  of  the  high  coiffures,  it 
must  be  admitted,  were  wonderful  works  of  ex- 
travagant art.  An  excellent  and  comparative- 
ly tasteful  specimen  of  one  of  these  coiffures  is 
given  in  the  bust  reproduced  in  our  illustration, 
being  the  portrait  of  the  sister  of  Louis  XVI., 


BUST   OF   MARIE   ADELAIDE 


165 

Marie  Adelaide,  Queen  of  Sardinia  (1759-1802). 
This  coiffure  is  an  architectural  monument  in  hair, 
the  work  of  one  of  those  masculine  capillary  ar- 
tists who  first  made  their  appearance  in  modern 
Europe  in  the  eighteenth  century,  and  of  whom 
the  most  famous  were  Legros,  Frederic,  and  Leo- 
nard, who,  mounted  on  a  ladder,  as  the  satirists  of 
the  day  used  to  say  : 

"Batissait  des  cheveux  le  galant  edifice." 

The  great  revolutionist  in  coiffure  was  Legros, 
who  was  cook  to  the  Comte  de  Bellemare  before 
he  opened  an  academy,  composed  of  three  classes, 
in  which  he  taught  valets  de  chambre,  chamber- 
maids, and  coiffeuses  the  new  art  of  hair-dressing 
based  upon  the  proportions  of  the  head  and  the 
character  of  the  face,  la  proportion  de  la  fete  et  Vair 
du  visage,  and  upon  the  principles  and  precepts 
laid  down  by  the  artist  in  the  year  1765  in  his 
great  and  amusing  work,  Art  de  la  Coiffure  des 
Dames  Francises,  which  was  the  starting-point  of 
a  complete  philosophy  of  the  toilet,  and  of  the 
most  extravagant  vagaries  in  head-gear  that  the 
world  has  ever  seen,  even  more  various  than  the 
three  hundred  coiffures  of  the  wife  of  Marcus 
Aurelius.  Before  the  end  of  the  century  did  not 
Paris  see  ladies  wearing  on  their  heads  coiffures 


166 

d  ^inoculation,  where  the  triumph  of  vaccination 
was  allegorized  by  means  of  a  serpent,  a  club,  a 
rising  sun,  and  an  olive-tree  covered  with  fruit? 
And  the  coiffure  d  la  belle  Poule,  which  was 
adorned  with  a  frigate  in  full  sail?  And  the  coif- 
fure au  Pare  anglais,  where  the  hair  was  made 
the  foundation  on  which  were  figured  landscapes 
with  meadows,  trees,  running  brooks,  and  browsing 
sheep  ?  And  the  coiffure  d  la  Monte  au  del,  which 
inspired  the  English  and  French  caricaturists  with 
such  pleasant  inventions  ?  All  these  wild  conceits 
will  be  found  minutely  depicted  in  the  prints  of 
the  last  century,  and  carefully  classified  in  the 
portfolios  of  the  Bibliotheque  Rationale  at  Paris. 
There  we  will  leave  them  to  the  solicitude  of  the 
curious  and'  the  vain  researches  of  frivolous  archae- 
ologists, for  it  is  not  our  desire  to  weary  our  fair 
readers  with  a  multitude  of  vain  details,  and  so 
cause  them  to  wrinkle  their  foreheads  with  a  frown 
of  dissatisfaction.  We  prefer  to  leave  to  ruthless 
Time  that  ungrateful  task— as  Shakespeare  hath  it 
in  his  incomparable  sonnets — which 

"...  doth  transfix  the  flourish  set  on  youth 
And  delves  the  parallels  in  beauty's  brow." 

(Sonnet  LX.) 


BUST  OF  MARIE  ADELAIDE — REVERSE  VIEW 


THE  ROMANTIC   PERIOD 

ABOUT  the  year  1780  the  reaction  against  the 
extravagant  coiffures  to  which  we  have  already 
referred  set  in,  under  the  influence  of  the  writings 
of  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau.  The  dresses  were  a  la 
turque,  a  la  Creole,  a  Vanglaise,  and,  before  the  Rev- 
olution broke  out,  the  Parisian  ladies,  in  their 
thirst  for  simplicity,  had  reached  a  point  where 
they  found  nothing  simple  enough  unless  it  was  a 
I1  enfant.  During  the  Revolution  fashion  became 
entirely  emancipated,  and,  in  the  state  of  anarchy 
which  ensued,  Madame  Tallien  reigned,  but  did 
not  govern;  her  influence,  however,  contributed 
perhaps  to  popularize  the  return  to  Greek  and  Ro- 
man models,  which  the  discovery  of  Pompeii  and 
Herculaneum  had  once  more  brought  into  notice, 
and  which  the  great  painter  David  adapted  to  the 
modern  spirit  in  his  popular  compositions.  The 
Directory  continued  the  movement  in  favor  of 
anticomanie,  and  added  to  it  anglomanie,  and  the 
craze  for  new  inventions  once  more  possessed  the 


170 

Parisian  ladies,  their  milliners,  and  their  coiffeurs. 
Hence  the  invention  of  innumerable  wigs^cE  Van- 
glaise,  d  V  espagnole,  d  la  Venus,  a  la  Titus,  d  la 
Caracalla,  d  VAspasie,  d  la  Sapho.  One  day  nets 
were  in  fashion,  the  next  day  chignons,  and  the 
next  the  golden  spirals  of  long  ringlets.  Ai- 
grettes, feathers,  plates  and  diadems  of  gold,  triple 
chains  of  gold,  strings  of  pearls,  the  corymbion  and 
the  ca/pillaments  of  the  Roman  empresses  were 
successively  added  to  the  arsenal  of  accessories  with 
which  the  coquettes  adorned  their  hair,  and  Madame 
Tallien  appeared  at  a  ball  at  the  Opera  with  rings 
on  her  toes  and  her  bosom  covered  with  diamonds, 
while  Madame  Recamier  persisted  in  the  simplici- 
ty of  her  virginal  white  robes  and  her  coiffure  of 
short  curls  bound  by  a  simple  fillet— Madame  Re- 
camier, whose  beauty  has  become  legendary  and 
typical,  thanks  to  her  romantic  life,  and  above  all 
perhaps  to  the  portrait,  now  in  the  Louvre,  by 
which  David  has  immortalized  her  features.  Of 
this  epoch  we  shall  care  to  remember,  perhaps, 
only  one  coiffure,  somewhat  in  the  style  of  that 
worn  by  Madame  Recamier,  somewThat  Greek,  too, 
in  its  simplicity,  and  yet  peculiarly  characteristic 
of  many  of  the  best  and  most  interesting  portraits 
of  the  second  half  of  the  eighteenth  century.  This 
is  the  arrangement  of  loose  curls  bound  by  a  mod- 


173 


erately  broad  ribbon  shown  in  our  engraving  of 
the  portrait  of  the  beautiful  Countess  of  Albany, 
by  the  French  painter  Francois  Xavier  Fabre 
(1766-1837),  of  Montpellier.  This  portrait  is  hung 
in  the  Uffizi  Gallery,  at  Florence,  side  by  side  with 
a  portrait  of  Alfieri,  by  the  same  artist,  and  no  one 
can  look  at  it  without  feeling  attracted  and  inter- 
ested by  the  personality  of  the  model,  whose  name 
is  inseparably  linked  with  that  of  the  great  Italian 
poet.  Married  to  the  pretender  Charles  Stuart, 
the  Countess  of  Albany  took  refuge  in  a  convent 
in  order  to  escape  from  the  brutality  of  her  drunk- 
en husband,  after  whose  death  she  retired  to  Flor- 
ence, where  she  died  in  1824,  at  the  age  of  seventy- 
two.  Alfieri,  who  became  deeply  attached  to  her, 
has  celebrated  her  name  and  her  misfortunes  in  his 
works  and  in  a  special  biography.  She  was  the 
golden  chain  that  held  captive  the  poet's  fickle 
heart ;  without  her,  he  says,  he  would  have  pro- 
duced nothing  of  any  worth — sensa  laquella  non 
avreifatto  nullo  di  buono.  The  remains  of  Alfieri 
and  of  the  Countess  of  Albany  are  buried  together 
in  a  common  tomb  in  the  church  of  Santa  Croce, 
at  Florence,  between  the  tomb  of  Michael  Angelo 
and  that  of  Machiavelli. 

With  the  portrait  of  the  Empress  Josephine  by 
Prud'hon  (1758-1823),  and   of  the  Countess  Ee- 


174 


gnault  de  Saint- Jean  d'  Angely,  by  the  Baron  Gerard 
(1770-1836),  we  come  to  the  palmy  days  of  the 
Empire  and  the  splendor  of  the  court  of  Napoleon 
I.  Prud'hon,  who  possessed  the  spirit  of  ancient 
Greece,  whereas  David  possessed  only  the  letter, 
painted  Josephine  in  the  fresh  background  of  the 
park  of  La  Malmaison,  herjhair  bound  in  the  an- 
tique stylevby  a  triple  jewelled  fillet,  smiling,  some- 
what sentimental,  too  gentle  a  creature  for  such  a 
mighty  husband.  Gerard  has  painted  the  Count- 
ess Regnault  with  simple  waved  ~bandeaux  covering 
the  ears  and  two  little  pendent  ringlets — a  coiffure 
that  has  a  suggestion  of  classical  antiquity  for 
those  who  are  familiar  with  the  busts  of  the  impe- 
rial families  of  the  Roman  Empire,  and  a  coiffure 
which,  whether  loosely  undulated  or  smoothly 
brushed,  will  always  please  those  who,  like  Sir 
Joshua  Reynolds,  would  always  have  the  hair  "so 
braided  as  to  ascertain  the  size  and  shape  of  the 
head."  The  costume  of  the  Countess  is  altogether 
in  antique  style,  and  the  shoulders  and  bosom  are 
covered  merely  with  transparent  tulle,  the  beautiful 
arms  being  left  bare.  The  two  coiffures  here  rep- 
resented seem  to  us  worthy  of  admiration  and 
characteristic  of  the  epoch,  though  of  course  at  the 
imperial  court -the  hair  of  the  ladies  was  dressed 
with  much  more  splendor,  especially  on  ceremo- 


THE   SISTERS,  Bl'   DEVEKIA 


177 


nious  occasions.  The  Emperor  had  endowed  his 
generals  and  his  ministers  most  liberally,  and  he 
required  them  to  spend  their  money  in  doing  him 
honor.  Therefore,  their  wives  knew  that  the  best 
way  to  please  the  sovereign  was  to  appear  in  mag- 
nificent array,  covered  with  diamonds  and  precious 
stones  that  were  used  to  adorn  the  great  combs 
then  in  fashion,  or  the  heavy  diadems  worn  well 
forward  over  the  forehead,  as  we  see  in  David's 
picture  of  the  coronation  of  the  Empress.  The 
Emperor  himself  paid  great  attention  to  the  toi- 
lette of  the  court  ladies,  and  while  they  were  still 
fresh  to  their  new  glory  and  inexperienced  in  ele- 
gance, his  Majesty  was  not  chary  of  reprimands. 
Even  the  imperial  princesses  did  not  escape  re- 
proaches when  their  toilettes  were  not  thoroughly 
in  harmony  with  the  fete  or  ceremony  which  they 
graced  with  their  presence.  The  Emperor  saw  in 
a  color  or  in  a  particular  kind  of  trimming  a  mani- 
festation of  criticism  or  of  opposition  which  existed 
only  in  his  own  imagination.  Furthermore,  the 
Empress,  the  imperial  princesses,  and  the  ladies  of 
the  court  were  not  prepared  by  their  past  habits 
and  education  for  the  important  role  which  the 
course  of  events  and  the  fortunes  of  Bonaparte 
had  called  upon  them  to  play.  Hence  the  tone  of 
gossip,  the  frivolity,  and  the  paltry  rivalries  which 


178 


characterized  the  court — rivalries  which  the  empe- 
ror himself  encouraged,  because  he  preferred  to  have 
the  ladies  concerned  with  any  trifles  rather  than 
with  politics.  The  great  man  withal  held  women 
in  small  esteem,  and  never  hesitated  to  scold  them 
with  a  brutality  which  made  Talleyrand  say : 
"  What  a  pity  that  so  great  a  man  is  so  rude !" 
(Quel  dommage  qvlun  si  grand  homme  soit  si  mal 
elevef).  Thus  one  day  he  reprimanded  the  Count- 
ess Regnault  de  Saint- Jean  d'Angely  in  presence  of 
the  whole  court  because  he  found  her  too  beautiful, 
and  because  she  eclipsed,  in  his  opinion,  another 
lady  in  whom  for  the  moment  he  took  a  particular 
interest. 

During  the  Empire  the  great  coiffeur  was  Micha- 
lon,  who  drove  his  cabriolet  with  a  negro  groom 
behind,  charged  a  louis  for  dressing  a  lady's  hair, 
and  was  altogether  as  great  a  coiffeur  as  ever  lived, 
and  the  predecessor  of  the  celebrities  of  the  pres- 
ent day.  Indeed,  by  this  time  the  coiffeur — that  is 
to  say,  the  artist  who  arranges  hair  in  harmony 
with  physiognomies  —  was  an  accepted  and  neces- 
sary institution,  having  the  prestige  of  a  century 
of  existence,  and  of  a  profession  clearly  defined 
and  distinct  from  that  of  the  barber  and  the  wig- 
maker,  or  perruquier.  This  distinction,  we  may 
add  with  a  view  to  excusing  a  digression  which 


COUNTESS   DE   SAINT-JEAN   n'ANGELY,  BY   GERARD 


181 


may  be  found  not  unamusing,  was  established  by 
a  trial  in  the  year  1718,  when  the  corporation  of 
perruquiers  tried  to  prevent  the  ladies'  coiffeurs 
from  exercising  their  newly  created  trade.  On 
this  occasion  Maitre  Bigot  de  la  Boissiere  published 
a  memoir  on  behalf  of  the  coiffeurs,  wherein  we 
read  the  following  statements,  which,  though  doubt- 
less true  enough,  will  perhaps  appear  to  some  mod- 
erate minds  slightly  pretentious  and  even  extrava- 
gant: 

"  We  are,"  says  the  memoir,  "  essentially  ladies' 
hair-dressers,  and  such  functions  have  secured  us 
protection;  but  this  protection  has  made  others 
jealous,  as  might  have  been  expected.  The  bar- 
bers and  wig-makers  have  come  armed  with  their 
dummy  heads,  and  have  been  bold  enough  to  pre- 
tend that  it  is  their  function  to  dress  the  hair  of 
ladies.  They  have  abused  certain  decrees  which  do 
not  apply  to  our  case,  and  have  caused  several  of 
us  to  be  imprisoned.  They  hold  their  razors  to  our 
throats,  and  it  is  against  this  tyranny  that  we  are 
now  obliged  to  implore  the  help  of  Justice."  The 
memoir  then  goes  on  to  explain  that  there  is  a 
wide  difference  between  the  trade  of  the  barber 
and  wig-maker  and  the  talent  of  dressing  ladies' 
hair.  "The  profession  of  the  wig-maker  belongs 
to  the  mechanic  arts,  and  that  of  the  ladies'  hair- 


182 

dresser  to  the  liberal  arts.  We  are  neither  poets 
nor  painters  nor  statuaries,  but  by  our  special  tal- 
ents we  give  grace  to  the  beauty  which  the  poet 
sings ;  it  is  often  after  us  that  the  painter  and  the 
statuary  represent  beauty ;  and  if  the  hair  of  Ber- 
enice has  been  placed  among  the  stars,  who  knows 
if  it  did  not  require  our  aid  in  order  to  arrive  at 
that  high  degree  of  glory?  The  details  that  our 
art  embraces  are  infinitely  numerous:  a  forehead 
more  or  less  large,  a  face  more  or  less  round,  de- 
mand very  different  treatment ;  nature  requires  al- 
ways to  be  embellished  or  its  defects  to  be  repaired ; 
and  here  the  coiffeur  must  be  a  painter,  familiar 
with  nuances,  with  the  use  of  chiaro-oscuro,  and 
with  the  distribution  of  light  and  shade,  in  order 
to  know  how  to  give  more  life  to  the  complexion 
and  more  expression  to  the  charms.  At  one  time 
the  whiteness  of  the  skin  will  be  relieved  by  the 
dark  tint  of  the  hair,  and  the  too  vivid  brilliancy 
of  the  blonde  will  be  attenuated  by  the  ashen  color 
that  we  apply  to  the  hair ;  the  treatment  varies  in 
each  case  according  to  the  different  situations. 
The  coiffure  for  a  first  meeting  is  not  the  same  as 
that  for  a  marriage ;  and  the  coiffure  for  the  mar- 
riage is  different  from  that  for  the  day  after  the 
marriage.  The  art  of  dressing  the  hair  of  a  prude, 
and  of  allowing  her  pretensions  to  be  perceived 


MADAME   PREVOST,  BY   GRIEVE  DON 


185 


without  making  them  obtrusive ;  the  art  of  dis- 
playing the  coquette,  and  of  making  the  mother 
appear  to  be  the  elder  sister  of  the  daughter ;  the 
art  of  suiting  the  coiffure  to  the  affections  of  the 
soul  which  some  one  is  desired  to  comprehend,  to 
the  desire  to  please,  to  the  languid  bearing  which 
wishes  only  to  interest,  to  the  vivacity  which  will 
not  brook  resistance — all  this  requires  an  intelli- 
gence which  is  not  common  and  a  tact  which 
must  be  inborn.  The  art  of  the  coiffeur  de  dames 
is  therefore  an  art  bordering  upon  genius,  and  con- 
sequently it  is  a  free  and  liberal  art." 

The  general  opinion  is  that  women  were  never 
so  badly  dressed  as  they  were  between  the  Ees- 
toration  and  the  end  of  the  reign  of  Louis  Phi- 
lippe, and  he  would  indeed  be  a  bold  man  who 
would  venture  to  maintain  the  contrary.  Never- 
theless, during  that  epoch  which  we  roughly  des- 
ignate by  the  conventional  date  of  1830  there 
were  invented  certain  coiffures  that  seem  to  be 
not  wanting  in  charm.  The  general  scheme  of 
dressing  the  hair  was  a  high^  chignon,  generally 
composed  of  loops  and  bows  of  hair  brushed  into 
flat  bands,  and  accompanied  by  more  or  less  vo- 
luminous curls,  rolls,  shells,  loops,  or  boucles  on 
each  side  of  the  temples,  t^jojily_^raament L  being 
flowers  or  ribbons  or  a  little  fichu  tied  over  the 


186 


head.  Examples  are  given  in  our  illustrations  : 
"  The  Sisters,"  by  Deveria,  showing  simple  curls 
and  a  chignon  of  loops  and  braids ;  the  portrait 
of  the  singer,  "  Madame  Prevost,"  showing  more 
voluminous  curls ;  and  the  fancy  head,  "  Marie," 
by  Grevedon,  being  a  specimen  of  a  coiffure  com- 
posed of  looped  hair$  which  is  certainly  not  want- 
ing in  grace. 

In  point  of  fact,  a  beautiful  face  is  always  beau- 
tiful, whatever  may  be  the  style  in  which  it  is 
framed,  and  the  art  of  the  epoch  in  question  is  by 
no  means  wanting  in  faces  that  are  beautiful,  and 
that,  too,  in  a  manner  peculiarly  characteristic  of 
the  times.  These  were  the  days  of  the  heroines 
of  Balzac,  the  days  when  Byron,  Ossian,  and  Wal- 
ter Scott  were  d  la  mode,  the  days  of  the  Cjothic 
revival,  of  Komanticism,  and  of  reminiscences  of 
chivalry  and  mediaeval  sentimentality.  Therefore 
it  is  not  strange  that  the  ladies  of  1830  were  ex- 
ceedingly romantic,  elegiac,  plaintive,  melting  with 
tenderness,  and  full  of  noble  aspirations  towards 
an  ideal  which  was  purely  literary  and  probably 
false.  They  dreamed  of  pages  and  chatelaines  and 
knights-errant;  at  the  same  time  they  allowed 
themselves  to  be  compared  to  Yenus,  Terpsichore, 
Hebe,  or  Atalanta ;  and  in  their  gardens  they  loved 
to  meditate  in  a  temple  of  Flora  or  a  grotto  dedi- 


MARIE,"  BY    GUEVEDON 


189 


cated  to  the  Naiades  over  the  thrilling  pages  of  the 
Yicomte  d'Arlincourt's  mediaeval  novel  Le  Solitaire, 
the  misfortunes  of  the  tender  and  mysterious  Elo- 
die,  or  the  pathetic  heroes  of  Madame  Delphine 
Gay.  Above  all  things,  they  were  mindful  of 
beauty,  in  spite  of  the  strange  manner  in  which 
they  often  adorned  it ;  and  for  this  we  should  be 
grateful  to  them;  for,  so  far  as  concerns  expres- 
sion and  bearing,  they  were  in  a  way  the  prede- 
cessors of  the  aesthetic  ladies  of  our  own  days,  in- 
asmuch as  their  ultimate  ideal  was  inspired  by  the 
literature  and  the  art  of  the  past,  by  reminiscences 
of  the  age  of  chivalry  and  romances  of  mediaeval 
princesses— influences  which  we  venture  to  find  as 
worthy  of  respect  as  the  poetry  of  Eossetti  and 
the  paintings  of  the  pre-Raphaelites.  Compared 
with  the  women  of  the  eighteenth  century,  whose 
ideal  of  beauty  was  successively  frivolous  piquancy 
and  affected  ingenuousness,  the  women  of  1830 
seem  to  us  infinitely  noble  and  refined,  and  we  can 
well  understand  the  admiration  which  they  com- 
manded, whether  they  wore  quaintly  looped  chi- 
gnons, or  drooping  ringlets,  or  crisp  side-curls,  or 
high  combs,  or  simply  those  flat  and  sheeny  ban- 
deaux a  la  Vierge  that  frame  with  contrasting 
curves  the  pure  oval  of  a  brunette's  face — those 
bandeaux  which  Leonardo  da  Yinci  loved  to  draw, 


190 


and  which  Perugino  used  to  spend  hours  in  arrang- 
ing with  his  own  hands  on  the  head  of  the  beau- 
tiful girl  whom  he  married  when  he  was  already 
a  graybeard. 

All  these  romantic  and  sentimental  preoccupa- 
tions we  see  depicted  in  the  limpid  looks  and  lan- 
guishing attitudes  of  the  ladies  of  this  period,  in 
their  unruffled  countenances  and  liquid  eyes,  in  the 
satiny  smoothness  of  their  glossy  curls,  in  their 
expression  of  calm  tenderness  and  delicacy  of  soul. 
Doubtless  the  sentimentality  of  these  times  was 
often  ridiculous,  and  the  verses  a  la  mode  truly 
inferior:  and  yet  we  may  be  sure  that  when  these 
fair  ladies,  the  image  of  our  grandmothers,  were 
in  the  land  of  the  living,  their  voices  rang  sweetly 
in  the  ears  of  men,  and  that,  in  the  words  of  Cap- 
tain Steele,  they  were  listened  to  with  partiality, 
and  approbation  sat  in  the  countenances  of  those 
with  whom  they  conversed  even  before  they  com- 
municated what  they  had  to  say. 


XI 
ON  JEWELRY  AND  ORNAMENTS 

THE  arts  of  the  goldsmith  and  of  the  jeweller 
were  born  simultaneously.  Their  history  begins 
at  the  same  moment.  As  soon  as  prehistoric  man 
commenced  to  find  pleasure  in  drawing  the  profile 
of  an  aurochs  on  the  flint  of  his  hatchet,  prehis- 
toric woman,  we  may  be  sure,  was  already  col- 
lecting colored  pebbles,  boring  holes  in  them,  and 
stringing  them  into  necklaces  and  ear-rings.  The 
love  of  ornament  seems  to  be  instinctive  and  in- 
curable. We  shall  probably  delight  in  personal 
ornaments  to  the  end  of  time,  and  therefore  it  is 
good  to  let  the  mind  dwell  upon  the  subject,  with 
a  view  to  comprehending  the  why  and  the  where- 
fore, and  thereby  intensifying  our  pleasure. 

By  jewelry  we  mean,  roughly  speaking,  personal 
ornaments  of  metal  with  or  without  the  addition 
of  precious  stones.  Each  part  of  the  body  has  its 
special  jewelry.  The  head  has  the  crown,  the  dia- 
dem, the  fillet,  the  taenia,  hair-pins,  aigrettes,  comEs, 

f rentals,  nets,  flowers,  tiaras,  mitres.    For  the  ears 

10 


192 

and  the  nose  there  are  rings  and  droppers.  For 
the  neck  there  are  necklaces,  collars,  carcanets, 
pent-d-cols,  lockets,  medallions,  amulets.  For  the 
neck  and  bosom,  to  be  worn  over  the  garments, 
are  brooches,  pins,  clasps,  fibula,  breastplates,  but- 
tons, pendants,  reliquaries,  chains,  crosses,  badges, 
insignia,  and  decorations.  For  the  waist  there  are 
girdles,  buckles,  chains,  chapelets,  chatelaines,  es- 
carcelles,  and  smelling-bottles.  For  the  legs  there 
are  rings,  anklets,  chains,  twists,  spinthers,  peri- 
carps, and  dextrals.  For  the  wrists  and  arms 
there  are  bracelets  and  bands ;  for  the  fingers 
and  toes  there  are  rings.  For  the  usages  of  the 
toilet  there  are  mirrors  and  combs  and  a  hundred 
dainty  objects  which  the  art  of  the  jeweller  beau- 
tifies. There  are  jewels  for  ,all  ages  and  for  all 
sorts  and  conditions  of  men,  women,  and  children ; 
there  are  jewels  civil  and  jewels  religious,  royal 
and  warlike  jewels,  jewels  sacred  and  profane,  new- 
fashioned  and  old-fashioned,  and  of  infinite  varie- 
ty. Jewelry  and  pottery,  such  are  almost  the  only 
relics  that  remain  of  the  most  ancient  civilizations. 
The  houses,  the  vestments,  the  iron  utensils,  and  the 
arms  of  the  remote  past  have  returned  to  dust  to- 
gether with  the  people  who  made  and  used  them, 
but  the  ornaments  have  remained.  In  the  muse- 
ums of  Europe  and  Boulak  we  see  countless  spec- 


193 


imens  of  Egyptian  jewelry  of  glass,  cut  stones, 
gold,  bronze,  and  enamel.  Similar  in  character 
and  material  are  the  necklaces  of  glass  beads 
and  pendent  masks  and  the  gold  ornaments  of 


GOLD  WREATH   OF  MYRTLE   LEAVES,  ANTIQUE   ITALO-GREEK 

the  Phoenicians,  who,  according  to  Castellani,  were 
the  inventors  of  filigree-work.  In  the  museums  of 
Berlin,  Athens,  and  St.  Petersburg  we  see  the  col- 
lections of  gold  ornaments  dug  up  by  Dr.  Schlie- 
mann  in  the  subsoil  of  ancient  Troy,  and  the  beau- 
tiful Greek  jewelry  discovered  in  the  country  of 


194 

the  ancient  Scythians,  in  the  mounds  of  Koul-Aba 
and  Kertch.  In  the  Louvre  and  the  British  Mu- 
seum we  can  study  the  marvellous  jewelry  dis- 
covered in  recent  years  in  Magna  Grsecia  and 
Etruria  through  the  intelligent  violations  of  the 
cemeteries  of  Vulci,  Cervetri,  Chiusi,  and  Tosca- 
nella.  In  various  collections  are  contained  speci- 
mens of  the  jewelry  of  the  Assyrians,  the  Chal- 
daBans,  the  Persians,  the  Byzantines,  the  Moors, 
the  Indians,  of  the  barbarian  hordes  of  the  North, 
and  of  all  the  nations  of  medieval  and  modern 
Europe  down  to  our  own  times.  The  materials 
abound  ;  their  co-ordination  and  historical  expla- 
nation are  merely  matters  of  patience  and  erudi- 
tion. 

We  have  not  the  grave  purpose  of  making  a 
historical  study  of  jewelry,  but  merely  of  calling 
attention  to  a  few  examples  of  beautiful  work  of 
the  past,  with  a  view  to  provoking  discussion,  dis- 
satisfaction, and  the  spirit  of  criticism  among  those 
who  buy  and  those  who  wear  jewelry ;  for  when 
we  have  seen  the  gold  ornaments  of  the  Greeks 
and  the  Etruscans,  made  with  22-carat  yellow  gold, 
we  are  inclined  to  look  with  indifference  upon  the 
productions  of  the  modern  jeweller's  art,  exception 
being  made  of  the  setting  and  mounting  of  pre- 
cious stones,  in  which  the  nineteenth  century  is 


195 


supreme.  The  sprig  of  flowers  or  the  branch 
of  foliage  executed  in  diamonds  by  contemporary 
Parisian  artisans  is  an  ornament  truly  artistic, 
and  comparable  in  its  way  to  the  beautiful  dia- 
dems and  fibulas  of  Athens,  and  to  the  splendid 
and  poetical  jewelry  of  the  Renaissance.  But  our 
modern  gold  ornaments,  our  necklaces,  our  ear- 
rings, our  brooches,  how  meagre  in  conception, 
how  hideous  the  burnished  surface,  and  how  dis- 
agreeable the  color !  What  modern  brooch  or 
agrafe  can  be  compared  for  grace  and  invention 
with  an  antique  Italo-Greek  fibula  ?  What  modern 


TWO  FIBULAE  OF  BEATEN  GOLD,  ANTIQUE  ITALO-GREEK 

diadem  surpasses  in  delicacy  of  design  and  work- 
manship this  wreath  of  myrtle  leaves  that  once 


196 


rested  on  an  Etruscan  brow  ?    What  ear-rings  are 
made  more  dainty  than  the  antique  Greek  pendants 
of  winged  Victory  surmounted 
//'/  r.  by  the  solar  disk,  or  Cupids  sus- 


ANTIQUE   ITALO-GREEK  EAR-RINGS 


pended  by  fine  chains,  or  the  hundreds  of  de- 
signs in  filigree  and  granulated  gold  of  Greek  or 
Italo-Greek  invention  ?  What  necklaces  are  more 
sumptuous  than  those  triple  and  quadruple  rows 
of  pendants,  rosettes,  and  studs  hanging  from  slen- 
der hairlike  chains  that  have  been  found  in  Etruria 
and  in  the  Crimea  ? 

Of  late  years  archa3ologists  have  begun  to  use  the 
word  Etruscan  very  carefully  when  speaking  of  ob- 
jects of  art,  and  to  prefer  the  less  compromising 
term  Italo-Greek,  for  in  reality  we  know  very  lit- 


197 


tie  about  Etruscan  art  beyond  the  fact  that  it  is 
obviously  a  more  or  less  original  combination  of 
Oriental  and  Hellenic  elements.  In  the  earlier 
Etruscan  art  the  Oriental  influence  is  supreme ;  in 
the  later  art  the  Hellenic  influence  reigns  unrival- 
led. But  how  was  the  primitive  Oriental  influence 
exercised  ?  Who  were  the  intermediaries  between 
the  East  and  central  Italy,  where  the  Etruscajis  ex- 
isted in  the  form  of  a  great 
political  confederation  as  early 
as  the  tenth  century  B.C.  ?  Were 
the  Etruscans  colonists  from 
Asia  Minor?  If  this  hypothe- 
sis be  not  true,  how  does  it 
happen  that  we  find  the  same 
system  of  burial  in  Etruria  and 
in  Asia  Minor  ?  Why  do  the 
Etruscans  alone  of  the  Medi- 
terranean peoples  practise  the 
art  of  divination?  Why  do 
they  wear  Oriental  costume  — 
long  flowered  robes  with  brill- 
iantly colored  borders,  Lydian 
sandals,  and  hoods  that  remind 
one  of  the  Phrygian  bonnet? 
Why  are  the  Etruscan  games  and  amusements  of 
Lydian  origin  ?  All  these  questions  the  archaeolo- 


A.NTIQUE    ITALO-GKEEK 
EAR-RING 


198 

gists  ask  with  a  desire  to  find  confirmation  of  the 
legend  of  the  Lydian  emigration  under  Tyrrhenes, 
which  Herodotus  has  recorded,  and  which  Yirgil 
has  embellished. 

On  the  other  hand,  although  an  Asiatic  migra- 
tion into  Etruria  cannot  be  absolutely  demonstrat- 
ed, the  commercial  relations  between  Etruria  and 
the  East  are  indisputable,  and  the  intermediaries 
were  the  Phoenicians.  The  Etruscans,  through  the 
Phoenicians,  were  in  commercial  relations  with 
Carthage,  Egypt,  Greece,  and  the  East.  Their 
markets  were  supplied  with  all  the  products  of  the 
East — gold,  silver,  ivory,  precious  stones,  purple, 
jewelry,  caskets,  decorated  ceramics,  imitation  As- 
syrian and  Egyptian  wares.  These  objects  of 
Asiatic  style  were  used  as  models  by  the  native 
Etruscan  workmen  for  the  manufacture  of  bronze 
utensils,  jewelry,  and  rings,  and  thus  the  most  an- 
cient objects  of  art  of  Etruscan  origin  are  decorated 
exclusively  with  Eastern  designs  —  roses,  palms, 
lotus  flowers,  lions,  tigers,  panthers,  fantastic  ani- 
mals, sphinxes,  griffins,  winged  bulls.  Even  during 
the  Eoman  epoch  the  Etruscans  continued  to  em. 
ploy  Eastern  motifs  and  patterns  to  decorate  mir- 
rors and  cinerary  urns,  to  compose  frames  for  paint- 
ings, handles  and  feet  for  vases,  and  ornaments  for 
furniture  and  all  kinds  of  utensils.  These  Oriental 


199 


motifs  became  so  usual  that  they  passed  into  the 
traditions  of  Roman  art,  and  thence,  at  the  time  of 
the  Renaissance,  into  modern  art,  where  they  con- 
tinue to  constitute  one  of  the  chief  resources  of  our 
silversmiths,  jewellers,  potters,  and  wood-carvers. 

As  for  the  Hellenic  influence  in  Etruria,  it  is  ev- 
idently very  ancient,  for  it  is  certain  that  Hellenic 
emigration  into  Italy  began  long  before  the  historic 
period,  while  the  commercial  relations  which  this 
emigration  established  gradually  developed  century 
after  century,  until  the  Hellenic  influence  became 
preponderating.  The  great  objects  of  commerce 
were  pottery,  painted  vases,  and  gold  jewelry.  The 
immense  majority  of  the  so-called  Etruscan  vases 
were  indisputably  manufactured  in  Greece,  and 
there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  the  most  beau- 
tiful and  elegant  specimens  of  that  gold  jewelry 
which  we  call  Etruscan  were  made  not  by  native 
artists,  but  by  the  Greeks,  who,  alone  of  the  an- 
cients, had  taste  so  exquisite  that  they  never  sacri- 
ficed beauty  of  form  to  profusion  of  detail  or  exu- 
berance of  fanciful  decoration. 

Meanwhile  this  antique  Greek  or  Italo-Greek 
jewelry  remains  masterly,  and  in  certain  details  of 
delicate  manipulation  inimitable.  The  process  of 
manufacture  is  not  chasing,  chisel-work,  stamping, 
or  moulding,  but  soldering  and  superposition.  This, 


200 


according  to  Castellani,  is  the  reason  why  the  gold 
ornaments  of  the  ancients  have  so  marked  a  charac- 
ter, deriving  their  distinction  from  the  spontaneous 
idea  and  inspiration  of  the  artist,  rather  than  from 
the  cold  and  regular  execution  of  the  workman. 
The  very  imperfections  and  voluntary  neglect  of 
certain  parts  give  to  antique  jewel- 

ry an   artistic  ap-  $  pearance  that  we 

seek  for  in  vain  fH\%  m  most  modern 
work,  which  is  uni-  J  |  form  and  weari- 
some in  aspect,  f  |  commonplace,  and 
wanting  in  inti-  wSffiJl!  mite.  Then  again 


RENAISSANCE  PENDANT   AND  BRACELET 

the  gold  ornaments  of  antiquity  are  more  charm- 
ing and  brilliant  to  the  eye  than  modern  work  be- 
cause the  matter  employed  is  different.  The  an- 
cients, like  the  artists  of  the  Renaissance,  used 
gold  22  carats  fine,  only  two  parts  of  alloy, 


201 


just  sufficient  to  give  the  resistance  and  durability 
which  absolutely  pure  gold  does  not  possess,  and 
yet  not  enough  to  impair  the  brilliancy  of  the 
precious  metal.  Gold  of  22  carats  is  not  oxi- 
dizable,  and  does  not  blacken  in  the  fire.  It  re- 
mains of  a  fine  yellow  color,  which  improves  with 
wear,  and  needs  no  polishing.  Its  beauty  resides 
in  the  substance  itself,  which  is  unchangeable. 
Gold  of  this  quality  is  perfectly  malleable,  and 
receives  enamels  of  all  kinds  without  changing 

o      o 

their  color  or  lessening  their  transparency.  The 
gold  employed  by  modern  jewellers  is  18  carats 
fine ;  it  is  slightly  oxidizable ;  it  changes  the  color 
of  certain  enamels ;  under  the  action  of  fire  the 
surface  becomes  covered  with  copper  oxides,  which 
need  to  be  removed  by  scraping,  and  then  the  ob- 
ject has  to  be  polished  with  pumice,  tripoli,  and 
rouge,  or  else  colored  yellow  by  immersion  in  baths 
of  salts  and  acids.  The  artificial  coloring  and  pol- 
ish thus  obtained  disappear  with  wear,  and  the  ob- 
ject becomes  more  or  less  hideous,  .whereas  the 
22-carat  yellow  gold  improves  with  age.  It  may, 
however,  be  asked  whether  the  average  modern 
eye  is  sufficiently  educated  to  appreciate  the  beauty 
of  the  color  of  gold  and  the  fine  shades  of  tone  in 
transparent  enamel. 

In  the  massive  jewelry  of  the  Middle  Ages  the 


MIRROR-CA8E,  FOUKTEENTH  CENTURY,  FRENCH 

modern  woman  will  perhaps  find  but  few  suggest- 
ions for  elegance.  On  tbe  other  hand,  in  the  toi- 
let accessories  of  that  epoch  there  are  many  ex- 
amples worthy  of  imitation,  at  least  so  far  as  the 
spirit  is  concerned.  The  collections  of  the  Louvre, 
the  British  Museum,  South  Kensington,  and  the 
museums  of  Italy  and  Germany  are  very  rich  in 


toilet  articles  of  ivory  and  boxwood,  which  well 
repay  a  passing  glance.  The  ivory  mirror-cases 
are  always  most  elaborately  carved,  generally  with 
scenes  of  chivalry  and  love.  In  the  South  Ken- 
sington Museum,  one  mirror -case  represents  four 
mounted  knights  fighting  at  the  foot  of  a  battle- 
men  ted  tower,  from  the  top  of  which  three  maid- 
ens pelt  them  with  roses.  Another  represents  the 
castle  of  Love  besieged  by  mounted  knights,  who 


SIXTEENTH   CENTUUY   COMB,  FKENCII 

climb  up  the  towers  with  rope-ladders  and  elope 
with  willing  ladies.  Other  mirror -cases  in  the 
British  Museum  are  adorned  with  representations 
of  the  storming  of  the  castle  of  Love,  hunting-par- 


204 


ties  whore  the  ladies  with  hawks  on  their  lists  ride 
side  by  side  with  their  lords,  scenes  of  courtship, 
concerts,  serenades,  the  stories  of  Lucretia  and  of 
Pyramus  and  Thisbe,  the  Nativity,  the  adoration 


SIXTKKNTH   CICNTUUY    COMB,   ITALIAN 

of  the  Magi,  etc.  Mediaeval  combs  are  also  carved 
with  similar  subjects.  One  comb  in  the  South 
Kensington  collection  represents  a  concert,  and 
men  and  women  dancing;  another  comb  of  the 
beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  is  adorned  with 
a  scene  which  appears  to  be "~  the  judgment  of 
Paris;  another  very  beautiful  Italian  comb  of  the 
same  date  is  ornamented  with  arabesque  scroll- 
work and  medallions  enclosing  busts.  \\ro  may 
safely  affirm  that  no  lady  of  the  present  day  combs 


205 

her  hair  with  such  an  exquisitely  artistic,  comb  as 
this  one. 

Several  specimens  of  the  jewelry  and  ornaments 
of  the  time  of  the  Renaissance  have  been  noticed 
incidentally  in  previous  pages,  notably  in  connec- 
tion with  the  portraits  of  the  two  daughters  of 
Charles  V.  and  of  the  Duchess  of  Urbino.  At  the 
moment  when  the  rediscovery  of  antiquity  pro 
ducod  that  splendid  movement  of  art  and  thought 
which  wo  call  the  Renaissance  there  existed  three 
schools  of  jewellers  whose  works  are  known  to  us 
chiefly  through  the  monuments  of  painting  and 
sculpture.  The  Flemish  painters  have  depicted  for 
us  the  jewelry  of  Bruges  and  Uhent;  the  primi- 
tive painters  of  Italy  show  us  the  jewelry  of  Sienna 
and  Florence ;  and  the  mediaeval  sculptors  have 
preserved  the  types  of  the  jewelry  of  old  France. 
The  triumph  of  the  Renaissance  spirit  in  Italy,  and 
the  spread  of  Italian  influence  all  over  Europe,  put 
an  end  to  the  personality  of  these  local  schools, 
and  brought  into  vogue  the  style  to  which  we  give 
the  name  of  Renaissance — a  style  created  by  the 
independent  efforts  of  many  great  men,  but  yet 
strongly  impressed  with  certain  common  charac- 
teristics. In  the  days  of  the  Renaissance  the  great 
designers  of  jewelry  were  Mantegna  and  Michael 
Angelo,  Ghirlandajo  and  Pollajuolo,  Frarieia  and 


206 


Yerrocchio,  Benvenuto  Cellini  and  Leonardo,  Al- 
bert Diirer  and  Jean  Cousin ;  for  at  that  time  the 
great  artists  were  universal,  and  the  painter  did 
not  think  it  undignified  to  design  a  brooch  or  the 
sculptor  to  model  a  salt-cellar.  The  artists  of 
the  Renaissance  were,  however,  unacquainted  with 
actual  specimens  of  antique  jewelry,  no  objects  of 
importance  having  been  found  until  the  excava- 
tions of  the  present  centu- 
ry in  Etruria  and  the  Cri- 
mea. They  were  therefore 
saved  from  the  danger  of 
imitation,  and  left  without 
guide  or  model  to  apply  to 
decorative  purposes  the  ma- 
terials which  the  newly  dis- 
covered literature  and  art 
of  pagan  antiquity  placed 
at  their  disposal.  Thus  we 
find  the  jewelry  of  the  Re- 
naissance ornamented  with 
figures  of  gods,  fauns,  sa- 
tyrs, and  grotesque  figures 

of  mythological  inspiration,  engraved  in  stones, 
chased  on  gold,  cast,  repousse,  and  enamelled ;  for 
it  was  especially  in  the  art  of  chiselling  and  enam- 
elling that  the  artists  of  the  Renaissance  excelled. 


RENAISSANCE    PENDANT 


207 


The  Renaissance  pendants  are  peculiarly  character- 
istic, and  a  fine  specimen  is  the  merman  reproduced 
in  our  illustration,  made  of  a  baroque  pear!3  with 


••     :,,;.>•••' ' 

;.V^-'V. 

I 

•• 


TliE   MEltMAN 


hanging  pearls  mounted  in  gold,  and  enriched  with 
precious  stones  and  colored  enamels  most  ingen- 
iously disposed.  Yery  beautiful,  too,  are  the  Re- 
naissance pendants  of  regular  design,  and  the  rich 
bracelets  and  magnificent  ceintures  and  chains  of 
beautifully  wrought  gold  embellished  with  colored 
enamel  and  gems.  But  of  beautiful  jewelry  we 
might  give  countless  examples  were  the  number  of 


our  illustrations  unlimited,  and  were  we  sure  of  not 
fatiguing  the  attention  of  the  reader  by  the  reiter- 
ation of  views  which  are  perhaps  too  completely 
opposed  to  current  contemporary  ideas.  Thanks 
doubtless  to  atavism  or  mysteriously  innate  Orien- 
tal prejudices,  the  writer  of  these  vain  pages  takes 
no  interest  in  the  programmes  and  results  of  uni- 
versities for  women.  Vassar  laureates  and  Girton 
graduates  are  indifferent  to  him.  His  conviction 
is  that  for  a  woman  gifted  with  beauty  the  ideal 
occupation  is  to  wear  beautiful  clothes  and  orna- 
ments, and  look  charming.  He  would  fain  see 
women  loaded  with  jewelry  like  idols,  with  dia- 
dems and  ear-plates  on  their  heads,  long  droppers 
in  their  ears,  their  bosoms  glittering  with  neck- 
laces, their  waists  encircled  with  girdles  of  glory, 
their  arms  stiff  with  bracelets,  and  their  ankles 
bedecked  with  rings  that  would  jingle  as  they 
walked.  Evidently  this  ideal  cannot  be  realized 
in  the  actual  conditions  of  Occidental  life,  with  its 
lack  of  privacy  and  modesty,  its  brusqueness  of 
movement  and  gesture,  its  haste  and  unquietness 
in  all  things.  Therefore  it  is  useless  to  pursue  fur- 
ther these  fragmentary  studies  of  jewelry  and  fem- 
inine adornments,  the  more  so  as  the  Renaissance 
was  soon  blighted  by  the  Reformation,  since  which 
event  the  adornment  of  beauty  has  been  tolerated 


209 


at  the  best  rather  than  frankly  commended  and 
encouraged.  Nevertheless,  women  continue  to  be 
beautiful,  and  there  are  at  the  present  day  thou- 
sands and  thousands  of  ladies  who  dress  divinely ; 
but,  with  the  exception  of  the  Arab  women  of  the 
Ouled  ISTa'il  tribe  and  the  Nautch  girls  of  India,  no 
modern  woman  wears  enough  jewelry  and  orna- 
ments of  gold.  For  that  reason  we  have  been 
obliged  to  limit  our  admiration  to  the  pictures  and 
statues  of  the  past,  and  to  enjoy  in  imagination 
what  the  meanness  of  the  age  refuses  to  the  desire 
of  the  eyes. 


THE    END 


U  UJJOI*.  ** 

LOAN  DEPT. 


JR1V65^|** 


.IF.,  BERK. 


LD  2lA-60w-3,'65 
(F2336slO)476B 


YC  27651; 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


